Born 1966 in Toronto, Canada

Education

1992-1994 MFA Visual Arts (Painting / Drawing), University of Guelph

1990-1991 MA English Literature and Creative Writing, University of Windsor

1985-1989 BA English Literature, York University
BFA Visual Arts, York University

Solo Exhibitions

2003 Michael Gibson Gallery, London, ON (October) Galerie Rene Blouin, Montreal

2002 Present Tense, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, ON
Of Being Numerous, Trepanier Baer Gallery, Calgary, Alberta
Dialogue(s) Lise Boisseau, Michel Daigneault, David Urban, Musee d'art contemporain de Montreal, QC

2001 Dialogue(s) Lise Boisseau, Michel Daigneault, David Urban, Centre d'exposition de Val d'Or, Quebec (in association with the Musee d'art contemporain de Montreal, QC)

2000 David Urban: Transport to Summer, Sable-Castelli Gallery, Toronto , ON
David Urban: North, Sable-Castelli Gallery, Toronto, ON
David Urban: Credences of Summer, Trepanier Baer Gallery, Calgary , Alberta
Galerie Rene Blouin, Montreal, QC

1999 David Urban, Gina Rorai, Macdonald Stewart Art Centre, Guelph, ON

1998 Parts of a World, Art Gallery of Peel, Peel Heritage Complex, Brampton , ON (also shown at the McMaster Museum of Art, Hamilton , ON and the University of Waterloo Art Gallery, Waterloo , ON
Parts of a World, Galerie Barbara Farber / Rob Jurka, Amsterdam , The Netherlands
Jim Schmidt Contemporary Art, St. Louis , Missouri
Like Seeing Fallen Brightly Away, Sable-Castelli Gallery, Toronto , ON

1997 Form and Colour Society, Galerie Rene Blouin, Montreal, QC
Douglas Udell Gallery, Vancouver, BC
David Urban: New Paintings, Trepanier Baer Gallery, Calgary, Alberta

1996 Farewell to an Idea, Sable-Castelli Gallery, Toronto, ON
The Quill of Darkness, Galleria In Arco, Turin , Italy
Entering Language, Trepanier Baer Gallery, Calgary, Alberta

1995 Easel Painting, David Beitzel Gallery, New York, New York
The Anderson Gallery, Buffalo, New York
Trepanier Baer Gallery, Calgary, Alberta - Project Room
A Cold Spring, Sable-Castelli Gallery, Toronto, ON

1994 Reform School, Galerie Barbara Farber, Amsterdam , The Netherlands
Expandable Language, Sable-Castelli Gallery, Toronto, ON

1993 Gubbinal, Gallery 788, Toronto, ON
Sable-Castelli Gallery, Toronto, ON

1989 IDA, Gallery York University, Toronto, ON

Selected Group Exhibitions

2003 Painters 15, Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art, Toronto, ON

2002 Vancouver Collects, Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, BC
Hungry Eyes, Dalhousie Art Gallery, Halifax, Nova Scotia
Recent Acquisitions, Birmingham Museum of Art, Alabama, US
Abstraction, Appleton Art Museum, Florida, US
Painters 15, Shanghai Art Museum, China (curator)

2001 Signs of the Spirit: The Donovan Collection at St. Michael's College, University of Toronto, ON
Suburbia, Art Gallery of Peel, Ontario
Durham Press Inc, Durham, Pennsylvania, US
Gottheiner Contemporary Art, St. Louis, Missouri, US
Trepanier Baer Gallery, Calgary, Alberta

1999 Translinear, McMaster Museum of Art, Hamilton, ON [Travelling to: Tom Thomson Memorial Art Gallery, Owen Sound, Ontario 2000; Mendel Art Gallery, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, 2000-2001; Plug-In Gallery, Winnipeg, Manitoba, 2001; Cambridge Galleries, Cambridge, ON, 2001; Kelowna Art Gallery, Kelowna, BC, 2001-2002]

Processes: Caio Fonseca, Jeffrey Graham, Robert Kelly, Antonio Murado, Tony Sherman, David Urban, Douglas Udell Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta (Travelling to Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, BC)

Les peintures, Galerie Rene Blouin / Galerie Lilian Rodriguez, Montreal, QC

Social Body, Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux Arts, Paris France

Contingency and Continuity: Negotiating New Abstraction, Macdonald Stewart Art Centre, Guelph , ON

1998 Show and Tell, Trepanier Baer Gallery, Calgary, Alberta

Robert McLean Gallery, Houston, Texas
Marcia Wood Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia

Durham Press : 10 Year Anniversary Exhibition, Marcel Sitcoske Gallery, San

Francisco Gallery, San Francisco, US

1997 Galerie Barbara Farber, Amsterdam
Stux Gallery, New York, New York

Abstraction / abstraction: geometries provisoires, Musee d'Art Moderne de Saint-Etienne, La Terrasse, France (with Helmut Federle, Mary Heilmann, Helmut Dorner, Jonathan Lasker, Juan Usle, et. al)

David Craven - Ric Evans - Tony Sherman - David Urban: On Paper, Sable-Castelli Gallery, Toronto, ON

New Modern: Art and Design in the Post Industrial City, Trepanier Baer Gallery, Calgary, Alberta

1996 Theories of the Decorative, Baumgartner Galleries Inc, Washington, DC

New Breed-A Synergy of the Arts, Lincoln Center; Saks Fifth Ave, New York, New York

The Quill of Darkness, Gallerie in Arco, Turin, Italy - with Peter Schuyff and Stefano Peroli

London Life : Young Contemporaries 1996, London Regional Art Gallery , London , ON

Galerie Barbara Farber, Amsterdam , The Netherlands

Second Skin, Macdonald Stewart Art Centre, Guelph, ON [Travelling to Rodman Hall Arts Centre, St. Catherines, ON, 1997; Lynwood Arts Centre, Simcoe, ON, 1997; The Gallery Stratford, Stratford, ON, 1997 ; Tom Thomson Memorial Art Gallery, Owen Sound, ON, 1998]

1995 Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, New York, US

1994 Fay Gold Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia

Edward Thorp Gallery, New York, New York

Kunst Rai, Galerie Barbara Farber, Amsterdam

1993 Body / Language (in collaboration with Doug Kirton), Zavitz Hall Gallery, University of Guelph

Guest Lectures

1996 University of Lethbridge, Alberta
Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, "Theories of the Decorative"
1995 U.A.A.C Conference, "Wilderness Stations: Painting and Historical Memory"
University of Guelph, Canada
1994 McMaster Museum of Art, Hamilton, Canada

Teaching Appointments

1994 Sessional Instructor: Painting, University of Guelph
1993 Sessional Instructor: Drawing, University of Guelph
Teaching Assistantship: "Art Theory and Criticism", University of Guelph
1992 Teaching Assistantship: Painting, University of Guelph
1991 Teaching Assistantship: Romanticism to Modernism Department of English Literature, University of Windsor
1990 Teaching Assistantship: Literary Genres, Department of English Literature, University of Windsor

Scholarships and Awards

1995 Canada Council "B" Grant
1993 Ontario Arts Council Exhibition Grant
Graduate Fellowship, University of Guelph
Ontario Graduate Scholarship, University of Guelph
1991 Ontario Graduate Scholarship, University of Windsor

Bibliography

Brackert, Donald, "Paintings Become the Real World". The Globe and Mail, 4 October 1998.

Breismaster, Holly, Artword Magazine, (Review), Issue No. 21, Spring 1995.

Cheetham, Mark, "Jazz Lines", Canadian Art, Vol 17, No 4, Winter 2000, p.86.

-, "Translinear", Canadian Art (Review), Fall 2001.

Couelle, Jennifer, "Paysages", La Presse, Montreal, April 1, 2000, p D17.

Cullum, Jerry. "What Abstraction Represents". Atlanta Journal-Constitution 10 June 1998.

Dault, Gary Michael, "Urban's abstracts get figurative", The Globe and Mail, Toronto, Saturday December 28, 2002, p. R6 (Review)

-, "David Urban at Sable-Castelli" The Globe and Mail, Toronto, October 21, 2000. p. R10

-, "Don't look at me like that - and other imperatives of Recent Abstract Painting", Canadian Art, Spring 2000. Vol 17, No. 1, p 62-69.
-"La peinture vivante". L'Oeil (October 1997)

Enright, Robert, "The Miraculous Question of Looking", An Interview with David Urban, Border Crossings, Vol 20, No 4, 2001, p 18-31.

George, Kate. CJRT Radio Interview, 27 January 1999.

Griswold, Alicia. "A Journey is Not a Commute" Artists and Madmen Weekly, vol. 4. 13, 22-28, May 1998.

Jordan, Betty Ann. "David Urban", Toronto Life Magazine, Vol 34, No 26, October 2000, p46.

Kisil, Gerry, "Consuming urbanization", Border Crossings, Vol 17, No 1 (Winter 1998) p46-47.

Lamarche, Bernard. Le Devoir, 11 July 1997.

Lehmann, Henry. "David Urban's abstracts also have something to do with soul-searching", The Montreal Gazette, 12 July 1997.

Locke, Donald. "Quantum Leap: Construction, Representation and Action at Marcia Wood", Creative Loafing, Atlanta 23 May 1998.

MacKay, Gillian, "David Urban at McMaster Museum of Art", The Globe and Mail, February 6, 1999 . p C13.

Marchand, Keith. "David Urban's use of the abstract", Montreal Mirror, 19-26 June 1997.

Mays, John Bentley. "Urban's Oblongs: Like a Mirror", The Globe and Mail, 2 April 1994

-"Rising Stars of Canadian Culture". The Globe and Mail, 31 December 1994.

-"Urban's Abstracts: Over the Top". The Globe and Mail, 4 March 1995.

-"The Triumph of Canadian Art". The Globe and Mail, 12 June 1995.

-"Night and Day" Canadian Art (cover), Vol 12, Winter 1995.

-"The drip turns 50", The Globe and Mail, Saturday, January 24, 1998 . p C1 & 6.

-"Paintings as defiance, a gesture against the void". The Globe and Mail, 15 May 1998.

-"The New Abstraction: to understand the new school of abstract art, think of a heartbeat captured on canvas". The National Post, 6 February 1999.

-"Present Tense #24", Amigo Motel, December 25, 2002.

Maclear, Kyo. Toronto Life, May 1998.

Miller, Earl, "Anne Lazare - Mirvish & David Urban: abstraction revived in Yorkville", Artfocus, Vol 4, No. 4 (Aug / Sept 1996), p 11-13.

Milroy, Sarah, "Brushes with the best", The Globe and Mail, May 11, 2002 .

Moos, David. "Punctual Painting". Amsterdam: Galerie Barbara Farber, 1994.

-"In the Suburbs of the Mind" Art + Text (November 1997)

Muller, Brian. "Abstraction / abstractions" Flash Art (October 1997).

Queen Street Quarterly I, vol. 1 ( Toronto ) (Spring 1997).

Scott, Michael, "Abstract Urban Art : Toronto Painter David Urban's work announces that modern art is alive and well" The Vancouver Sun, October 22, 1997 , p C5.

St. Gelais, Therese. "David Urban at Galerie Rene Blouin". Parachute 89 (Fall 1998):43-44.

Somers, David et al. David Urban: Parts of a World. Art Gallery of Peel, 1999.

Tousley, Nancy . "If you love painting…" The Calgary Herald, 6 April 1996.

Wachtel, Eleanor. "The Arts Tonight". CBC Radio Interview, 1 February 1999.

Catalogues

Beaudoin, Marie-France; Lussier, Real. "Dialogues", Musee d'art contemporain de Montreal et Centre d'exposition de Val-d'Or, 2001.

De Chassey, E. Social Body, Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris 1999.

Shuebrook Ron. "Contingency and Continuity : negotiating new abstraction", MacDonald Stewart Art Centre, Guelph , ON , 1999.

"The poetics of painting - a conversation with David Urban". Processes : Caio Fonseca, Jeffrey Graham, Robert Kelly, Antonio Murado, Tony Sherman, David Urban - interview with Robert Enright, Douglas Udell Gallery, Edmonton , Alberta , 1999.

Cheetham, Mark; Moos, David; Pagel, David. David Urban : Parts of a world. Art Gallery of Peel, McMaster Museum of Art, University of Waterloo Art Gallery , 1998.

de Chassey, Eric, Morineau, C. Abstraction / Abstraction, Geometries, Provisoires, Saint-Etienne: Musee d'Art Moderne 1997.

Moos, David. "The Quill of Darkness", Turin, Italy: Galleria in Arco, 1996.

Patton, James. Young Contemporaries. London, Ontario: London Regional Art Gallery, 1996

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