Demetrius Oliver (born March 2, 1975) is an American artist and educator based in New York City. He is known for site-specific, multi-disciplinary installations using photography, sculpture, and video. Using common materials and found imagery, his work explores such themes as

American transcendentalism Transcendentalism is a philosophical, spiritual, and literary movement that developed in the late 1820s and 1830s in the New England region of the United States. "Transcendentalism is an American literary, political, and philosophical movement of ...

, music, and

cosmology Cosmology () is a branch of physics and metaphysics dealing with the nature of the universe, the cosmos. The term ''cosmology'' was first used in English in 1656 in Thomas Blount's ''Glossographia'', with the meaning of "a speaking of the wo ...

Early life

Oliver received his B.F.A. from the

Rhode Island School of Design The Rhode Island School of Design (RISD , pronounced "Riz-D") is a private art and design school in Providence, Rhode Island. The school was founded as a coeducational institution in 1877 by Helen Adelia Rowe Metcalf, who sought to increase th ...

Providence Providence often refers to: * Providentia, the divine personification of foresight in ancient Roman religion * Divine providence, divinely ordained events and outcomes in some religions * Providence, Rhode Island, the capital of Rhode Island in the ...

, Rhode Island in 1998. He received his M.F.A in 2004 from the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (Penn or UPenn) is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. One of nine colonial colleges, it was chartered in 1755 through the efforts of f ...

Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

, Pennsylvania where he was a student of

Terry Adkins Terry Roger Adkins (May 9, 1953 – February 8, 2014) was an American artist. He was Professor of Fine Arts in the School of Design at the University of Pennsylvania. Early life Adkins was born in Washington, D.C., on May 9, 1953, into a mus ...

Career

Oliver was an artist-in-residence at the

Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture The Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture is an artists residency located in Madison, Maine, just outside of Skowhegan. Every year, the program accepts online applications from emerging artists from November through January, and selects 65 ...

Skowhegan Skowhegan () is the county seat of Somerset County, Maine, United States. As of the 2020 census, the town population was 8,620. Every August, Skowhegan hosts the annual Skowhegan State Fair, the oldest continuously held state fair in the Unite ...

, Maine in 2004; The Core Program in Houston, Texas from 2004 to 2006; and The Studio Museum in Harlem in New York City from 2006 to 2007;

Light Work Light Work is a photography center in Syracuse, New York. The artist-run nonprofit supports photographers through a community-access digital lab facility, residencies, exhibitions, and publications. History The organization is housed at Sy ...

in 2009 where he brought with him boulder-sized

anthracite Anthracite, also known as hard coal and black coal, is a hard, compact variety of coal that has a lustre (mineralogy)#Submetallic lustre, submetallic lustre. It has the highest carbon content, the fewest impurities, and the highest energy densit ...

that has recurred in his work. His residency at

Studio Museum in Harlem The Studio Museum in Harlem is an African-American art museum at 144 West 125th Street in the Harlem neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, United States. Founded in 1968, the museum collects, preserves and interprets art created by African A ...

in 2007 culminated in a show called ''Midnight's Day Dream'' and in 2009 his work was included in an exhibition there called ''30 Seconds Off an Inch'' curated by

Naomi Beckwith Naomi Beckwith (born 1976) is an American art historian who has been serving as the deputy director and chief curator of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum since 2021. Previously she had been the senior curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Ch ...

that featured a work he made with a suitcase of coal and light called '' Asterism'', evoking astronomy and fantasy. In 2011 Oliver participated in an exhibition about the impact of the work by Bettye Saar. The show featured work she was influenced by as well as artists like Oliver, who was influenced by her metaphysical, found object work. Other artists featured alongside Oliver were

David Hammons David Hammons (born July 24, 1943) is an American artist, best known for his works in and around New York City and Los Angeles during the 1970s and 1980s. Early life David Hammons was born in 1943 in Springfield, Illinois, the youngest of ten ...

Hank Willis Thomas Hank Willis Thomas (born 1976) is an American conceptual artist. Based in Brooklyn, New York, he works primarily with themes related to identity, history, and popular culture. Early life and education Hank Willis Thomas was born in 1976 in P ...

Radcliffe Bailey Radcliffe Bailey (November 25, 1968 – November 14, 2023) was an American Contemporary art, contemporary visual artist noted for Mixed media, mixed-media, paint, and sculpture works that explore African-American history. He was based in Atlanta, ...

and

Kiki Smith Kiki Smith (born January 18, 1954) is a German-born American artist whose work has addressed the themes of sex, birth and regeneration. Her figurative work of the late 1980s and early 1990s confronted subjects such as AIDS, feminism, and gender ...

. Oliver's work was shown for only one hour nightly during the run of '' Canicular'' at The Print Center in 2011, coinciding with the appearance of the dog star,

Sirius Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. Its name is derived from the Greek word (Latin script: ), meaning 'glowing' or 'scorching'. The star is designated Canis Majoris, Latinized to Alpha Canis Majoris, and abbr ...

. The show also featured manipulation of sound, heat and light, also evoking

astronomy Astronomy is a natural science that studies celestial objects and the phenomena that occur in the cosmos. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and their overall evolution. Objects of interest includ ...

but literally using elements referring to canines, like a dog whistle, thus possibly corralling the star-gazing visitors into controlled environments like a pet and making the actual freedom of space unattainable. He used objects and photography to create this installation. His exhibitions have included installations at the

High Line The High Line is a elevated linear park, greenway, and rail trail created on a former New York Central Railroad spur on the West Side of Manhattan in New York City. The High Line's design is a collaboration between James Corner Field Op ...

in New York City, 2010, and Observatory at D'Amelio Terras in New York City, 2002. In 2015 Oliver created an installation ''

Anemometer In meteorology, an anemometer () is a device that measures wind speed and direction. It is a common instrument used in weather stations. The earliest known description of an anemometer was by Italian architect and author Leon Battista Alberti ...

'' inspired by 300-year-old storms on Jupiter. That same year he showed a series called ''

Eclipse An eclipse is an astronomical event which occurs when an astronomical object or spacecraft is temporarily obscured, by passing into the shadow of another body or by having another body pass between it and the viewer. This alignment of three ...

'' at the

Henry Art Gallery The Henry Art Gallery ("The Henry") is a contemporary art museum located on the campus of the University of Washington, in Seattle, Washington, United States. Located on the west edge of the university's campus along 15th Avenue N.E. in the Un ...

Seattle Seattle ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The city is the cou ...

at the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW and informally U-Dub or U Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington, United States. Founded in 1861, the University of Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast of the Uni ...

that depicted the top of his head being hit with a jet of steam and was paired with words by astronomers. Oliver's work was included in a tribute show for

in 2016. Adkins and Oliver worked on a sound piece together called "

Harmonic In physics, acoustics, and telecommunications, a harmonic is a sinusoidal wave with a frequency that is a positive integer multiple of the ''fundamental frequency'' of a periodic signal. The fundamental frequency is also called the ''1st har ...

Spheres." He currently teaches at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

and is a part-time lecturer at

The New School The New School is a Private university, private research university in New York City. It was founded in 1919 as The New School for Social Research with an original mission dedicated to academic freedom and intellectual inquiry and a home for p ...

in New York City."Demetrius Oliver"
The New School. Retrieved May 17, 2015

References

External links

Official Website

{{DEFAULTSORT:Oliver, Demetrius 1975 births Living people 20th-century American artists 21st-century American artists American contemporary artists Artists from New York City University of Pennsylvania alumni Rhode Island School of Design alumni 20th-century African-American artists 21st-century African-American artists Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture alumni