THEO

Enkidu and the Cedars

A Toad at Sunrise

Before Night Falls

How old are you?

A bone in the grass

Lamb of Dog

Black Cap

Queen of the Night

Waiting at Dusk

Patient Poodle

Standing, Eyes Closed

The Longest Day

Buttercups

This is the Place

Walk Home Under Perseids

Little Hydrangea

Dazzler

Serious Play

Lost Sausage

Under a Primitive Sun

Samara

How do you sit?

Fireworks in autumn

Lancelot

HORSES, A UNICORN AND A DONKEY, Thamesmead Texas, London

CAROUSEL, Tinimini Room, Dordrecht, Netherlands

Paintings for the Cat Dimension, no format Gallery, London, UK

Batteries Not Included, Thamesmead Texas, London

Animals, Race Car Factory, Indianapolis, USA

IF [International Fairley], Resipole Art Gallery, Acharacle, UK

UWN Strategic Insight Programme Scholarship

Arts and Humanities Research Council Postgraduate Scholarship

BA Animation, Newport Film School, Wales, UK

Painting Open, No Format Gallery, London, UK

Pomegranate, Brixton East 1871, London, UK

Darkness on the Edge of Town, Perth Centre for Contemporary Photography, Perth, WA, Australia

Darkness on the Edge of Town, Beam Contemporary, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

David Surman's artwork captures the viewer's attention with its energetic brushstrokes, vivid colors, and crisp textures. Cute but not overdone, humorous but not serious, his expressionistic paintings of the natural world are a perfect fit for THEO, a gallery that strives for diversity, as they carry a meaning that hasn't been shown before, yet still speak to the viewer's intuitive gaze.

‘Sleepless Moon’, Surman’s first solo exhibition in Korea, invites us into the primal abyss of nature, which stems from his childhood experiences in rural environments. Beginning with ancient cave artworks, imagination has consistently been the method to contemplate our relationship with nature. Just as the magic of the cave artist could imaginatively turn a figure into an animal and create a cycle of life and death, the wildness of Surman’s depictions of animals and their habitats reminds us of a long-forgotten way of life. The return of humanity to the life of the poor peasant who survived, animal-like, according to the movements of their arms, legs, head and hands, and with a relationship to nature as “both an object of worship and of sacrifice” is completed on the canvas as a response to the thoroughly modern viewer facing the gaze of the moon, rocks, trees, grasses and flowers, and the creatures that comprise “the first group to surround man,” such as cows, crows, mice and cats. As humanity resolves its technological separation from nature that arose from fear and confusion, it does so under the watchful gaze of the landscapes and animals of Surman’s memories. The artist stresses the importance of the audience as a crucial part of the work, completing its communication and extending it into the world, as in Taoism’s 無爲 ‘wu wei’, where nothing is done but nothing is left undone. The painted image of the animal conveys a sense of vitality to the network of viewers, engaging them and directing empathy toward the living world. His paintings become landscapes of the past, reconstructed in the distant future where humans have disappeared.