200 Bloomfield Ave, West Hartford, CT 06117, United States
The Hartford Art School where Mark Dion received his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1986.
Gallery of Mark Dion
209 E 23rd St, New York, NY 10010, United States
The School of Visual Arts in New York City where Dion attended classes at from 1983 to 1984.
Career
Gallery of Mark Dion
Millbank, Westminster, London SW1P 4RG, United Kingdom
Tate Gallery where Dion has exhibited his artworks.
Gallery of Mark Dion
Cromwell Rd, Kensington, London SW7 5BD, United Kingdom
The British Museum of Natural History where Mark Dion has presented his artworks.
Gallery of Mark Dion
258 Main St, Ridgefield, CT 06877, United States
Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art in Ridgefield, Connecticut where Mark Dion has exhibited his artworks.
Gallery of Mark Dion
11 W 53rd St, New York, NY 10019, United States
The Museum of Modern Art in New York City where Mark Dion has exhibited his artworks.
Gallery of Mark Dion
25 Harbor Shore Drive, Boston, MA 02210, United States
The Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston where Mark Dion had a retrospective in 2017.
Gallery of Mark Dion
1996
New York City, New York, United States
Mark Dion at Lemonade Stand on Running a Lemonade Stand at the Armory Show.
Gallery of Mark Dion
2018
2650 S John Williams Way E, Tulsa, OK 74114, United States
Mark Dion at the Cabinet of Wonder, a project done in collaboration with Mark Scogin and Merrill Elam-Architects, at Gathering Place in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Gallery of Mark Dion
1000 Village Dr, Millville, NJ 08332, United States
Mark Dion at Wheaton Arts and Cultural Center searching for art material.
Gallery of Mark Dion
Charlottesville, Virginia, United States
Mark Dion at the temporary public artwork of 2016-2017 called Virginia Curiosity Shop in the University of Virginia.
Gallery of Mark Dion
Mark Dion working. Photo by Kip Evans, the Anchorage Museum and Alaskan Sea Life Center.
Gallery of Mark Dion
Scientist Carl Safina (on the left) and Mark Dion on the expedition along the Alaskan coastline to explore the buildup of marine rubbish ejected from the great gyres, or currents, in the Pacific Ocean. Photo by Kip Evans, the Anchorage Museum and Alaskan Sea Life Center.
Gallery of Mark Dion
Mark Dion at work. Photo by Kip Evans, the Anchorage Museum and Alaskan Sea Life Center.
Gallery of Mark Dion
Mark Dion in the rainforest of Guyana. Photo by Bob Braine.
2650 S John Williams Way E, Tulsa, OK 74114, United States
Mark Dion at the Cabinet of Wonder, a project done in collaboration with Mark Scogin and Merrill Elam-Architects, at Gathering Place in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Scientist Carl Safina (on the left) and Mark Dion on the expedition along the Alaskan coastline to explore the buildup of marine rubbish ejected from the great gyres, or currents, in the Pacific Ocean. Photo by Kip Evans, the Anchorage Museum and Alaskan Sea Life Center.
Mark Dion is a contemporary conceptual artist known for his scientific and archaeological approach to sculptures and installations. He also works in such mediums as drawing and photography.
One of his well-known artworks is an installation called the Neukom Vivarium placed in the Olympic Sculpture Park in Seattle, Washington.
Background
Mark Dion was born on August 28, 1961, in New Bedford, Massachusetts, United States to a working-class family.
Dion spent his early childhood in New Bedford but was mostly raised in Fairhaven. Both towns were not cultural centres although they possessed the reach historical architecture. That helped the young Mark to develop the interest to the history.
Education
Mark Dion began his artistic education in 1981 at the Hartford Art School of the University of Hartford in Connecticut. He graduated five years later with his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree.
Dion attended the classes at the School of Visual Arts in New York City from 1983 till 1984 and later participated at the one-year Independent Study Program of the Whitney Museum of American Art.
Besides, the artist obtained several Honorary degrees, including an honorary doctorate in Philosophy from the University of Hartford in 2002, an Honorary Fellowship of the Falmouth University in the United Kingdom in 2014 and an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from the Wagner Free Institute of Science in Philadelphia.
Mark Dion started his artistic career at the beginning of the 1990s. Since then, he has exhibited in various art galleries and museums like the Tate Gallery in London (1999), the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art in Ridgefield, Connecticut (2003), the Museum of Modern Art in New York City (2004), the British Museum of Natural History in London (2007), the Montevideo Biennale in Uruguay. In 2012, the artist took part at the Documenta exhibition 13 in Kassel, Germany.
To make his pieces of art more authentic from scientific or historian point of view, the artist often collaborates with natural history museums, aquariums and zoos which provide him with the information on nature or archeology.
Besides, Dion has completed a great number of public commissions in different countries. Among them are the installation for the National Tourist Routes in Norway (2012) or an important project called ‘OCEANOMANIA: Souvenirs of Mysterious Seas’ produced by him four years later for the Oceanographic Museum in Monaco.
The couple of recent shows where the public had a chance to admire Dion’s artworks took place in 2016 and 2017. The first one titled in French ‘ExtraNaturel: Voyage initiatique dans la collection des Beaux-Arts de Paris’ was held at the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Paris with the help of the artist’s art curator Sarina Basta. The second one, ‘Mark Dion: Misadventures of a 21st Century Naturalist’, which became one of the biggest retrospectives of Mark Dion, was held at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston.
Nowadays, Mark Dion lives in New York City where he occupies the mentor’s post at the Columbia University and in Pennsylvania where he co-directed the visual art education and residency program, Mildred's Lane.
Urban Wildlife Observation Unit, Madison Square Park, New York City
Library for the Birds of Massachussets
Providence Cabinet
Life Raft (Zurich)
Polar Bears and Toucans (from Amazonas to Svalbard)
When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth
Tropical Collectors (Bates, Spruce and Wallace)
Travels of William Bartram Reconsidered
Concrete Jungle (the Birds)
Encrustations
The Field Station of the Melancholy Marine Biologist
The Dark Museum-Blood Coral
sculpture
Snakestone
The Old Crow
The Unruly Collection
Bone Coral
Iceberg and Palm Trees
Encrustation Desk set
The Bureaucrat
Emanations of the Earth
The Collector at Rest
The Tar Museum - Goose
Views
Quotations:
"Museums are time capsules. They embody the values of their time. In the 19th century, the polar bear was presented as a fearful monster with sharp claws. Nowadays as a vulnerable creature that needs to be protected."
"The job of the artist is to go against the grain of dominant culture, to challenge perception and convention."
"Our understanding and relationship with the natural world shifts dramatically, and you can chart that shift by examining how we have materialized exhibitions. Like a historian, I am looking back and using images, displays and sculptures to understand how we’ve changed our notion of the natural world."