Adam Cullen

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

External link
to a portrait photo of Adam Cullen.
(Please note copyrights )

Adam Cullen's signature

Adam Frederick Cullen (born October 9, 1965 in Sydney , † July 28, 2012 in Wentworth Falls, Blue Mountains ) was an Australian painter , sculptor and performance artist who is considered one of the most important representatives of grunge in Australia . He won the prestigious Australian art prizes Archibald Prize (2000) and Sulman Prize (2003). Not afraid the artist's life, the controversy and its subversive image as " Bad - Boy-Artist “was overshadowed by mental and physical problems and conflicts with the law.

life and work

Early years

Adam Cullen was the son of contractor, teacher and Vietnam War veteran Kevin Cullen and his wife Carmel, an Irish actress in various Australian stage and television productions who also worked as a potter. Adam's half-brother Mark, seven years his senior, with whom he did not get along, emerged from an earlier relationship between his mother and a German steward . Adam grew up on Sydney's Northern Beaches in Collaroy , where "he was treated like a golden boy by loving, indulgent parents."

Francisco de Goya: Saturn devours its children , around 1823

During a stay in Madrid , Spain , Cullen visited the Museo del Prado with his parents at the age of 9 , where he sat down for a good hour in front of the work Goya's Saturn devours his children and looked at the picture in awe and emotionally agitated. Cullen saw this as an initial spark, a deep-seated inspiration for his further work. After returning from Spain, Adam visited his cousin, who lived with his family on a property in the Australian bush. With the help of some kelpie dogs , they caught a kangaroo with a lasso, held the animal to the ground and cut its tail off with a chainsaw while it was still alive.

At school, Adam liked to mingle with the "strong boys". He drew at a young age, and as a child, the local newspaper Collaroy Plateau regularly published his cartoons . His teacher was so disturbed by the oppressive motifs of his drawings that the school recommended his parents psychiatric help for their ten-year-old son. For a while he lived with his parents in the Blue Mountains west of Sydney and attended a local school there. At the age of 18 he told his parents: "I can no longer live here, you are too boring."

Cullen moved to Annandale in the Inner West of Sydney , a suburb not too far from the city center, and studied at the City Art Institute (now School of Art & Design ) of the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Sydney, where he 1987 received his Diploma of Professional Art . Here he was one of a group of experimental students who wanted to push the limits of art.

At school he first came into the limelight when he chained a decaying pig's head to his ankle in a performance for two weeks and pulled it into the lecture hall behind him. His friend, art critic Andrew Frost recalled that Cullen "had to sleep with his leg out of the window because of the stench and the performance only broke off when the bus driver refused to let him continue." In another lecture he carried as another of his art objects a groomed cat, to which he stated that he “ killed and pulled it off himself ”.

In 1999 he graduated from UNSW with a Master of Fine Arts . From 1994 to 2000, Cullen worked as a taxidermist and exhibition builder at the Australian National Maritime Museum in Darling Harbor . In the 1990s he became the enfant terrible of the art scene in Sydney and, alongside Dale Frank, Mikala Dwyer and Hany Armanious, one of the most important representatives of Australian grunge .

Cullen had used marijuana regularly since the age of fourteen , and soon more extensively as a student. After six months at art school, he took speed intravenously for the first time . In the toilets of the Marlborough Hotel pub in Newtown, Cullen began using heroin at the age of 21 in an attempt to “get off speed” which he found “extremely toxic”.

Artistic creation

The controversial artist's paintings questioned cultural and social roles in Australian culture and its subcultures, provocatively addressing the darker aspects of human existence in the form of satire and social allegory. He dealt with topics such as crime, the overlap between human and animal behavior and the changing role of masculinity in today's society. In his caricatural paintings, he often depicted dead kangaroos and cats, as he called it, “ Loserville ” (city of losers); People of the Australian underclass such as punks , headless women, tarts (Australian term for “ sluts ” or “ hookers ”), stockmen (Australian term for “ cowboys ”), bogans (Australian term for “ chicks ”), obesity and malformations or the folk hero Ned Kelly , all of whom, according to art critic Ashley Crawford, were "wrapped in dripping chaos." “When Cullen is feeling bitter, his painting is sore. When Cullen feels that the world is a humorous fallacy, his painting takes on an astute, diabolical folly in its cynicism, ”Crawford said. The relationship between mother Carmel and son Adam was not free of conflict. By his own admission, Cullen's portraits of women were actually images of his mother. However, his wives “never looked like nice, gentle mothers”.

For his mostly large-format works, he used canvas on which he applied acrylic, enamel, oil or lacquer colors with quick brushstrokes. The pictures, which are often reminiscent of graffiti , mostly had monochrome backgrounds, in front of which two-dimensional objects and figures outlined in black are depicted in strong, often bright neon colors. His brushstrokes, which were overloaded with paint, and his fast painting style, often left flowing, oozing effects. Some of his works contained short handwritten texts, his paintings My parents' telephone no. Is 99821626 (1996), My Dad Had Sex with My Mum (1997), Don't Poke Holes in the Air, You'll Suffocate the Fairies (1997 ) or Death is Gay (2005) should serve as examples.

The artists who inspired Cullen included Goya, Martin Kippenberger , Otto Dix , Albrecht Dürer , Philip Guston , Sidney Nolan and Mike Parr. While working in his studio in Wentworth Falls, he enjoyed listening to punk bands such as Scraping Foetus Off The Wheel, Butthole Surfers , Black Flag and Meat Puppets .

His work was sometimes criticized as "too simple, tasteless, pubescent or childish", others described his work as "repulsive and yet irresistible", "similar to a car accident [or] a brawl in a bar [...]". Commenting on his work, his ex-girlfriend, Carrie Miller, said: “[Adam] never got involved in complicated, abstract theories about the meaning of art. He always said that art just needs to attract attention. And that is exactly what the best of his works do in a captivating way. "

Cullen's paintings could sometimes appear to have been painted fairly quickly, and that was occasionally the case. However, behind many of his works there were dozens of sketches with which he allowed his ideas to mature. His other significant other, Cash Brown, said Cullen spent more time on his works than it might seem. "Some came about spontaneously, others he painted again and again until he got them right", until they [...] "were absolutely flat [] with this almost clinically clean surface." The real time expenditure could not be read from his finished work .

His works have proven to be popular with collectors and have been rated by some publications as "extremely collectable". Wayne Tunnicliffe, senior curator of Australian art at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, ranked Cullen's work from the mid-1990s (with text and graffiti-like images) and the paintings dating from around 2000 among his best works.

Together with his then partner Cash Brown, Cullen gave a performance entitled Home Economics at the Museum of Contemporary Art Sydney in 2005, which admitted in the context of the restrictions on freedom of speech proposed by the government under Prime Minister John Howard in the course of the introduction of an anti-terrorism law was understand. In the presentation las Cullen text from the Internet before, during Brown graphs lined with instructions for making supposed weapons of mass destruction, accompanied by a table with the Australian fair -Fastfoodspezialität Battered sav , along with household appliances such as a held together with Velcro sandwich maker (the one antipersonnel mine represented ) as well as with sparklers (as igniters), colored water (as gasoline), styrofoam and other objects available in hardware stores. Joanna Mendelssohn from the UNSW School of Art & Design described this performance as “his best performance” in her obituary post. Brown and Cullen also collaborated on a number of paintings.

As a sculptor , Cullen modeled "strangely grotesque sculptures of animals, skulls, imaginary beings and monsters," as his friend and art dealer Steven Archer described them. Archer had the figures cast in bronze , including some meter-long wild boars. Author Carolynne Skinner noted that the small bronze sculptures [Cullen] so effortlessly sculpted from plasticine were some of the finest pieces in his art. Together with the potter Lyn Hart, he also produced painted wall plates and other ceramic objects. His mother had taught him pottery at an early age.

Awards, honors and exhibitions

Adam Cullen was awarded an Artist-in-Residence Fellowship to follow his family history in rural Hill End, New South Wales (his great-great-grandfather, an Irish immigrant, mined Hill End) and "set up a new factory for exhibitions in To create Australia and overseas ”.

In 2000, Cullen won the Archibald Prize, an annual Australian portrait contest, for portraying Australian actor David Wenham , who played a murderer in The Boys , whose story was based on the 1986 rape and murder case of beauty queen Anita Cobby in Sydney . Cullen had chosen Wenham as a subject after he noticed him in the film. He later addressed the murder case again in the painting Anita and Beyond . Cullen described the circumstances of Cobby's death as a "heinous crime," but he expressed sympathy for their murderers, the Murphy brothers.

In 1997, 1998, 1999, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2011 and 2012, among others, Cullen reached the final of the Archibald Prize twelve more times . He is credited with changing the conservative nature of the jury with his contributions and paving the way for a whole generation of younger, experimental artists. In 2003 he received the Sulman Prize , in 2005 the Mosman Art Prize and in 2008 the Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize . In 2009 the hotel The Cullen in Prahran , a district of Melbourne , was named after the painter and sculptor and decorated with numerous of his works.

Cullen first showed his work in a solo show in 1993, then in over 200 group and solo shows in Australia and abroad; In 2002 he represented Australia at the 25th Biennale de Sao Paulo Iconografias Metropolitanas . In 2006 the Penrith Regional Art Gallery looked back on ten years of his work with a retrospective. In 2008 the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney presented a large overview exhibition of his work entitled Let's Get Lost . Works by Cullen are part of the collections of the Art Gallery of New South Wales and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney, the National Gallery of Australia and the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra , the National Gallery of Victoria and Monash University in Melbourne, the Art Gallery of South Australia in Adelaide, the Art Gallery of Western Australia in Perth and Griffith University in Brisbane .

Life after the Archibald Prize

Cullen's life, who liked to cultivate his subversive image, changed significantly when he won the Archibald Prize , which also had an impact on his psyche . “It increased my audience. I no longer stood for underground , no longer for non-establishment . All of a sudden I was part of the art world ... the bourgeoisie , "Cullen said in an interview. He had had enough of urban Sydney and shortly after winning the award he settled in a mountain cottage with his then partner Carrie Miller in Wentworth Falls in the Blue Mountains . His friend Jason Martin reported: “He had a balcony built. He grew orchids and had gardeners who constantly worked the garden. [...] He installed a pond for frogs and native fish. [...] But his father Kevin Cullen, a building contractor, had advised his son not to buy it; the house is a 'knock-down' ”, a demolition object.

The local community of artists initially welcomed the newcomers, Miller accepted the friendly invitations, but Cullen was more reserved. Miller struggled with her own inner demons; the two separated after Cullen had threatened them with a gun and a knife, with an "injunction against violence" as a result. Cash Brown, Cullen's temporary partner, had "the most contact" with Cullen between 2004 and 2007. Browne wrote, “Adam Cullen and I had an interesting relationship. First we were friends, then lovers, then friends, then acquaintances. At times we were enemies. Adam made some lifestyle choices that were incompatible with mine at the time, so we went our separate ways. "

Cullen, who had chosen a life in "existential backwoods", was a lover of motorcycles, rifles, pistols, knives and was also interested in taxidermy . He set up "soft traps" that enabled him to kill captured animals himself, which gave him great pleasure. His neighbor watched him shoot birds and kill a fox in the garden. So his considerable collection of dead animals and animal body parts grew, which were either "scattered around his cottage or stored in cool boxes". Over time, "the atmosphere in his house had become so obnoxious that no one would let Cullen in." In contrast, Cullen said in 2005, “I work a lot for charities, which are usually environmental or animal welfare related. We [as a society] are about to destroy the animal habitat, and the [animals] have no real lobby. "

Adam Cullen was proud of his friendship with criminal Mark "Chopper" Read , for whom he illustrated the infamous children's book Hooky the Cripple: The Grim Tale of a Hunchback who Triumphs in 2002. The liberal Australian daily The Age judged the joint work: “[T] he result is not for the faint of heart. It is definitely not a children's book. But certainly a fable in the tradition of dark, Gothic tales. ”He also portrayed Read several times, including for his contribution to the Archibald Prize in 2002, and in 2003 acted as best man at the second wedding of the underworld figure.

Alcohol and frequent long-distance taxi rides to obtain drugs were costly. There was competition among the taxi drivers for the jaunts that were attractive to them, which Cullen sometimes had to award three times a week with a value of A $ 300 each (≈ 220 euros). The route led from Wentworth Falls to a housing estate on the western edge of Sydney and after waiting for the driver back to the starting point. In times of financial hardship, Cullen occasionally paid taxi drivers and business people with his drawings. His work was the currency for a barter that went on to the satisfaction of everyone involved. He frequently came into conflict with the law through alcohol, drug, and gun offenses. The police had to move out to his cottage on several occasions to investigate complaints. Occasional convictions initially resulted in fines or community service such as the Ritz nursing home in Leura.

In July 2011, Cullen ran into a police stop near Goulburn where several weapons including a taser , pistols , rifles and a slingshot were found in his car . He also had a blood alcohol level that was more than double the legal limit. As a result, Cullen was charged with drunk driving and illicit firearms possession. His defense stated that he needed the guns on a private, rural property in advance of an exhibition "for the creation of art" (he had shot at cans of paint and let the paint splash over canvases). The court stripped Cullen of his driving license for five years and sentenced him to ten months in prison, but suspended the sentence on condition that he underwent medical therapy. Judge Lee Gilmour stated in her judgment that Cullen was an intelligent, artistic man. "But there are things that cause you emotional pain that you have not yet dealt with, and you have to do that". The defendant, who was terrified at the thought of imprisonment, agreed.

Adam Cullen had many faces. His demeanor could be dignified; he spoke pleasantly and looked serious and intelligent. The publicist Ashley Crawford said: “He can be charming or scratchy, beguiling or mysterious, enthusiastic or aloof. Sometimes he would hide in his hut in the mountains; once when the surrounding area was surrounded by bushfires, he had turned off his phone. Or he strolls through the Museum of Contemporary Art and enchants curators and critics alike. I saw how he amazed the artist Tim Storrier with his knowledge of firearms and how he beguiled publicists like Catharine Lumby and Ingrid Periz with his brilliant jokes. ”If you got to know him on these occasions, it seemed implausible that he too the infamous grunge artist, accomplice of criminals, drug addict, gun nut, and cat killer. Visitors to his studio reported that he was able to quickly switch to his performance mode and let the " bad boy artist" come to the fore. “At the Art Gallery of New South Wales he had witty conversations with his patron, the learned director Edmund Capon; but was also able to communicate on an equal footing with the somewhat simpler Mark 'Chopper' Read in a shabby pub in Collingwood . "Some critics described Cullen as" an attention- seeking enfant terrible whose main project was to shock the bourgeoisie ".

The death of his mother Carmel Cullen († 2011) from leukemia had hit him deeply, although their relationship was not free of conflict. Cullen had already disliked the consistency of breast milk. "I just never accepted a mother's love [...] I couldn't stand it." It was only when she died that Adam admitted that he actually "loved his mother above all else." The family was a big part of Cullen's life; he often expressed gratitude that his "parents had encouraged his talent from an early age". After the mother's death, father Kevin supported his son, who was still loved but also ill, who was struggling with bipolar disorder and severe physical health problems. His pancreas and gall bladder had been removed, he was a diabetic and was taking eleven different drugs a day. He rarely went into his studio without first drinking a bottle of vodka , which had caused his liver to suffer badly by the age of 37, and was also addicted to heroin . Cullen, who by his own admission had been "a bisexual in disguise all his life, " most recently lived alone in Wentworth Falls. Adam Cullen passed away in his sleep on July 28, 2012 at the age of 46.

reception

Erik Jensen, author of the book Acute Misfortune. The Life and Death of Adam Cullen , was a 19-year-old journalist for the Sydney Morning Herald in 2008 when Cullen invited him to stay in his guest room and write his biography. Cullen supposedly had a book deal for his own life story with a publisher in prospect, but it didn't exist. Over the next four years he immersed himself deeply in Cullen's world, accompanying him on drug deals in which Cullen "shot himself in the living room of his dealer while a toddler cries in front of the TV" was (accidentally) in the leg shot and bumped (intentionally) by a motorcycle traveling at high speed. Jensen documented intoxicated and often contradicting confessions of the artist for hours. According to Jensen, Cullen had internalized the quote "Perseverance is more important than truth" from Bukowski's Barfly and made it his "excuse for everything".

In his eulogy at Cullen's funeral at St. Rose Cemetery in Collaroy , his friend and defense attorney Charles Waterstreet said, “Like Jackson Pollock , he discovered a new and exciting way of bringing color to paper and canvas. And he did it better than anyone. Like Pollock, he drove fast and he drove drunk. He not only loved life, but squeezed life out of life. "

Gallery owner Michael Reid added that on a good day, Cullen was one of Australia's finest contemporary artists, and at the same time a benevolent person, many of his paintings worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, despite the devouring illness that had him firmly in its grip A $ donated to charity.

Cullen's friend Wayne Tunnicliffe, senior curator of Australian art at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, said: “He lived a pretty extreme life. [...] The extremes of his actions were not imposed, he lived the life that he represented. The broken men in his paintings are as much a self-portrait as they were representations of what went wrong in society. "

Ian Howard, Cullen's professor at the art school, noted that "... his life had become a performance and at times diverged from the reality of others".

filming

The director Thomas M. Wright processed the last chapter in Adam Cullen's life in the film Acute Misfortune in 2019 , the content of which was based on Erik Jensen's book. According to Wright, Cullen was “... not a genius. He was an extremely gifted painter. ”The film received the Age Critics Award at the Melbourne International Film Festival in 2019 .

literature

  • Erik Jensen: Acute Misfortune. The Life and Death of Adam Cullen. Black Inc., Carlton 2014, ISBN 978-1-86395-693-2 .
  • Ken McGregor, Janet Hawley, Jenny Zimmer: Adam Cullen. Macmillan Art Pub., Sydney 2009, ISBN 1-92139-423-4 .
  • Ingrid Periz: Adam Cullen. Scars Last Longer. Craftsman House, Sydney 2004, ISBN 0-97519-652-9 .

Web links

Commons : Adam Cullen  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Cullen's work in state galleries and museums

Video material

Remarks

  1. ↑ Brown described Cullen as "strong as an ox" who "suffered terribly from alcoholism". She found it difficult to understand “how the boy who grew up in loving surroundings could become such a tormented soul as an adult.”
    Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
    Original text: “Brown described him as being 'strong as an ox' but that he suffered dreadfully from alcoholism. She struggled to understand how a child who grew up in a loving environment could become so tortured as an adult. "
  2. ↑ Carolynne Skinner of Oz Arts Magazine had this in mind: “Although Cullen's defense attorney added that he had used his weapons to create works of art, it is difficult to see how a taser could be used for that purpose. I suspect that maybe it was intended for use on animals. ”
    Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
    Original text: “Although the charge against Cullen was defended on the basis that he used his guns to create artworks, it is difficult to see how a Tazer [sic!] Might be used for this purpose. The thought lingers that it may have been to use on animals. "

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Adam Cullen. Artist. In: University of New South Wales
  2. ↑ a b Tikitiboo Online Media: The work of Sydney artist, Adam Cullen (from 0:08:29) on YouTube , September 18, 2010.
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
  4. ↑ a b Joyce Morgan: Suspended jail sentence for award-winning artist. In: Sydney Morning Herald of November 11, 2011.
  5. ↑ Carmel Cullen. Actress. in the Internet Movie Database (English)
  6. ↑ Carmel Cullen. In: benny-hill.fandom.com
  7. ↑ a b Erik Jensen: Acute Misfortune. The Life and Death of Adam Cullen. Black Inc., Carlton 2014, ISBN 978-1-86395-693-2 , p. 46.
  8. ^ A b c Martin Edmond: Declivities & eminences. Review of Erik Jensen's: Acute Misfortune. The Life and Death of Adam Cullen. In: Sydney Review of Books, September 30, 2014.
  9. ↑ John McDonald: Acute Misfortune. In: Artist Profile, Issue 47, 2019.
    "[...] a family in which he had been treated as a golden boy by loving, indulgent parents."
  10. ↑ Adam Cullen. Lets's get lost - Anything I say or do - Australian Saints. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 2008, p. 5.
    Original text: “I was in Spain with my parents, in the Prado, when I was nine and a half, and apparently I was in awe of this image. It was called "Saturn devouring his children". It was a small work by Goya, and he was there chewing on this infant's head. I was overtaken with as much emotion as a nine and a half year old person can endure and / or fathom. I was there for almost an hour staring at this thing, and it's stuck with me until now… It's incredible how uplifting and inspiring artworks can be, even if they're repulsive, or demonic or black - they still inspire you. "
  11. ↑ Adam Cullen. Lets's get lost - Anything I say or do - Australian Saints. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 2008, p. 5.
    Original text: “Cullen recalls visiting his cousins ​​that lived on a property in the bush. He remembers them lassoing a kangaroo with the help of some kelpie dogs, and while they held the animal down, the cousins ​​cut off the kangaroo's tail with a chain-saw while it was still alive. The roo hobbles horribly, trying to balance without a tail. This happened after Cullen saw the Goya Disaster series in the Prado with his parents. "
  12. ↑ Erik Jensen: Adam Cullen's secret desires. In: Sydney Morning Herald of September 11, 2014.
    Original text: "At school, Adam liked mixing with the strong boys."
  13. ↑ a b c Catharine Lumby: Artist was drawn to darker side of human existence. In: Sydney Morning Herald, July 31, 2012.
  14. ↑ Elizabeth Fortescue: Tears and respect for a 'genius' at rebel artist Adam Cullen funeral. In: Perth Now of August 4, 2012.
    Original text: "At the age of 18 he told his parents: 'I can't live here any more, you're too boring [...]'" .
  15. ↑ a b c Excerpt from Eric Jensen's book Acute Misfortune: The Life and Death of Adam Cullen on the occasion of the Victorian Premier's Literary Awards 2015 . Wheeler Center, 2015.
  16. ↑ a b c d e f g Wendy Frew: Archibald winner and 'grunge' painter Adam Cullen dead at 47. In: Sydney Morning Herald of July 30, 2012.
  17. ↑ a b Academics remember grunge artist Adam Cullen. In: The Conversation of July 30, 2012.
  18. ↑ Catharine Lumby: Artist was drawn to darker side of human existence. In: Sydney Morning Herald of July 31, 2012.
    Original text: "Art critic and friend Andrew Frost recalls [...] that Cullen had to sleep with his leg out of the window because of the smell and abandon the performance when the bus driver refused to let him on. "
  19. ^ Ashley Crawford: Brush with controversy and creative brilliance. In: Sydney Morning Herald of July 31, 2012.
    Original text: "After that episode he wore a bald taxidermied cat which he claimed to have killed and skinned."
  20. ↑ Daina Fletcher: Remembering Adam Cullen. In: Australian National Maritime Museum
  21. ↑ Ken McGregor, Janet Hawley, Jenny Zimmer: Adam Cullen. Macmillan Art Pub., Sydney 2009, ISBN 1-92139-423-4 , blurb .
  22. ↑ Hany Armanious. Egypt born 1962, arrived Australia 1969. Untitled work, 1996, polyvinyl chloride, Purchased 1997. In: Catalog with 'Artwork Labels' for the exhibition Every Brilliant Eye: Australian Art of the 1990s at the National Gallery of Victoria , 2017.
  23. ↑ Ashley Crawford: Adam Cullen. When the weird turned Pro. In: artcollector.net.au, 2005.
    Original text: "[H] e was one of the hot names, alongside artists Mikala Dwyer and Hany Armanious when grunge was of the moment in the early 90s."
  24. ↑ Excerpt from Erik Jensen's book Acute Misfortune: The Life and Death of Adam Cullen on the occasion of the Victorian Premier's Literary Awards 2015 . Wheeler Center, 2015.
    Original text: “I used to shoot the fucking speed and it was awful. [...] That shit was toxic, it was really fucking toxic. "
  25. ↑ a b c Adam Cullen. In: HSC Visual Art Resources
  26. ↑ a b c Manya Sellers: Adam Cullen. In: Museum of Contemporary Art Sydney
  27. ^ The Maker: Adam Cullen. In: Australian Broadcasting Corporation, March 6, 2005.
  28. ↑ Search word tart. In: leo.org
  29. ↑ search word bogan. In: leo.org
  30. ^ Ashley Crawford: Brush with controversy and creative brilliance. In: Sydney Morning Herald, July 31, 2012.
  31. ↑ Ashley Crawford: Adam Cullen. When the weird turned Pro. In: artcollector.net.au, 2005.
    Original text: “When Cullen is feeling bitter, his painting is acidic. When Cullen feels that the world is a humorous mistake, his painting takes on a devil-may-care silliness, albeit one that is perceptive in its cynicism. "
  32. ^ Lindy Kerin: Grunge artist Adam Cullen dead at 47. In: Australian Broadcasting Corporation of July 30, 2012.
    Original text: "Adam's women were never nice, gentle mothers".
  33. ↑ My parents' telephone no. Is 99821626. In: Home of the Arts (HOTA), Gold Coast, 2021.
  34. ↑ Keri Glastonbury: Shut up, nobody wants to hear your poems! Painter versus poet. In: Cultural Studies Review, Issue 12, Number 1, March 2006.
  35. ↑ Adam Cullen. Lets's get lost - Anything I say or do - Australian Saints. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 2008, p. 7.
  36. ↑ Alex Gawronski: Adam Cullen: Looking for the man. In: artdes.monash.edu.au, 1999.
  37. ^ Adam Cullen - Artist (1965 - 2012). In: Cook Hill Galleries
  38. ↑ In Memoriam: Australian 'grunge' artist Adam Cullen, 47. In: Auction Central News of July 30, 2012.
    Original text: “His style had, at times, been called simplistic, crude, adolescent or puerile, although he also had been voted one of Australia's most collectible contemporary artists. "
  39. ↑ Adam Cullen. Lets's get lost - Anything I say or do - Australian Saints. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 2008, p. 5.
    Original text: “Cullen's work has been described as revolting and yet compelling, in much the same way as a car accident, a fight in a pub or the endless TV replays of an injury on the sporting field. "
  40. ↑ Catharine Lumby: Artist was drawn to darker side of human existence. In: Sydney Morning Herald of July 31, 2012.
    Original text: “He never subscribed to convoluted, abstract theories about the meaning of art. He would always say that art just needs to hold your attention. And in the most compelling way, that's exactly what the best of his work does. "
  41. ↑ Katrina Strickland: .silent departure of an Energized but disorderly artist In: The Australian Financial Review on July 31, 2012.
    Original text: "Cullen's paintings Could look as If They'd been whipped off Quickly, And They were oft, but behind Their sense of urgency and energy were dozens of sketches - not so much preparatory sketches for specific works as the outpouring of an artist who honed ideas gleaned through prodigious reading and thinking that way. Sydney artist Cash Brown, who was Cullen's partner from 2004 to 2006, says he spent more time on the actual works than it might appear. "Some happened immediately, others he would paint over and over until he got them right. But you probably couldn't work out which were which, "she says. "He would paint them again and again to get them clinically flat, that almost hospitalized, sanitized surface."
  42. ^ Archibald Prize-winning artist dies. In: 9news of July 29, 2012.
    Original text: "In 1998, the magazine Australian Art Collector included him in its list of the country's top most collectable artists."
    Wendy Frew: Archibald winner Adam Cullen dies aged 47. In: Sydney Morning Herald dated July 29, 2012.
    Original text: "... Adam Cullen, one of Australia's most collectible contemporary artists ..., has died."
    Adam Cullen. In: HSC Visual Art Resources
    Original text: "... made him one of Australia's most collectible artists of his generation."
    Mark Westall: Adam Cullen, one of Australia's most collectible contemporary artists has died at age 47. In: FAD Magazine of July 30th 2012.
    Original text: "Adam Cullen, one of Australia's most collectible contemporary artists has died at age 47."
    Catharine Lumby: Shocking, hilarious painter of dark side of existence. In: Sydney Morning Herald of August 10, 2012.
    Original text: "[…] he [Adam Cullen] became one of Australia's most collectable contemporary artists."
  43. ↑ Katrina Strickland: Silent departure of an energized but disorderly artist In: The Australian Financial Review of July 31, 2012.
    Original text: “Tunnicliffe points to his mid-1990s works, which used language and almost graffiti-like images, as among his best work, along with the "more painterly" works done around the year he won the Archibald. "
  44. ↑ An ode to Adam Cullen. In: cashbrown.company from January 23, 2014.
  45. ↑ a b Academics remember grunge artist Adam Cullen. In: The Conversation of July 30, 2012.
    Original text: “I think, though, his finest hour was in a performance piece at the Museum of Contemporary Art in 2005. The context was the climate of government-inspired paranoia about sedition and proposed restrictions on free speech. "
  46. ^ Cash Brown: Altered States - Collaborative works on paper with Adam Cullen. In: cashbrown.company
  47. ↑ Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
    Original text: “Cullen was known to sit for hours beside the fire making figures out of plasticine, strange grotesque sculptures of animals, skulls, figures and imaginary monsters which Archer sent away for casting in bronze. A couple of these Archer also had enlarged into impressive meter long boars [...]. "
  48. ↑ Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
    Original text: "I am not alone in remarking that the little bronze sculptures which were so effortlessly produced in plasticine, are up with the best of his art."
  49. ↑ Belinda Aucott: Haute grunge: Cullen ceramics. In: habitusliving.com from January 19, 2012.
  50. ↑ Adam Cullen. Murrays Cottage. In: hillendart.com
    Original text: “Cullen's interest in Hill End goes back to his Great Great Grandfather, who mined in Hill End after emigrating from Ireland. Cullen's residency will give him the opportunity to research his family roots in the area, as well as produce a new body of work for exhibition in Australia and overseas. Adam will use his time in Hill End to investigate the concept of landscape within his 'human' based 'scenographies' and to produce paintings, drawings, videos and installations. "
  51. ↑ a b Adam Cullen. Portrait of David Wenham. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales , Sydney 2000.
  52. ↑ Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
    Original text: "While describing Anita's rape and murder as 'a disgusting crime' Cullen also expressed sympathy for the murderers [the Murphy brothers]."
  53. ^ Archibald Prize 1997. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 1997.
  54. ↑ Adam Cullen. Portrait of Frank Moorhouse AM. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 1998.
  55. ↑ Adam Cullen. Max Cullen. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 1999.
  56. ↑ Adam Cullen. Mark Brandon Read - author. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 2002.
  57. ↑ Adam Cullen. Jimmy Little. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 2003.
  58. ↑ Adam Cullen. Margaret Throsby. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 2004.
  59. ↑ a b Adam Cullen. Edmund. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 2006.
  60. ↑ Adam Cullen. Charlie. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 2011.
  61. ↑ Paul Ryan. Cullen - been feudine. In: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney 2012.
  62. ↑ a b James Vyver (National Portrait Gallery): Treasure Trove: Adam Cullen's Neil Armfield portrait. In: Australian Broadcasting Corporation, August 2, 2012.
  63. ↑ Tributes flow for Archibald winner Adam Cullen who has died at age 47. In: news.com.au of July 30, 2012.
  64. ↑ Adam Cullen. 1965-2012. In: National Portrait Gallery , Canberra.
  65. ↑ Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
    Original text: “Winning the Archibald changed my whole life - my whole aspectual psyche. It enlarged my audience. I was no longer underground, non-establishment. All of a sudden I was part of the art world ... the bourgeois. "
  66. ↑ Lindy Kerin: Grunge artist Adam Cullen dead at 47. In: Australian Broadcasting Corporation of July 30, 2012.
    Original text: "I just felt compelled to leave the urban and urbane environment of Sydney".
  67. ↑ Carrie Miller. In: artcollector.net.au, 2020.
  68. ↑ Elizabeth Fortescue: Wentworth Falls home of controversial artist Adam Cullen on market for $ 359,000. In: The Daily Telegraph of April 11, 2013.
    “He had a balcony made. He grew orchids and had gardeners working through the garden all the time. [...] He installed a pond for frogs and native fish. [...] But his father Kevin Cullen, a builder, had told his son the house was a 'knock-down'. "
  69. ↑ RU OK? Suicide survivor Carrie Miller has a message of courage and hope. In: Australian Broadcasting Service Illawarra of September 14, 2017.
  70. ↑ Erik Jensen: Acute Misfortune. The Life and Death of Adam Cullen. Black Inc., Carlton 2014, ISBN 978-1-86395-693-2 , p. 94.
    Original text: “He threatened [his own long term partner Carrie] with a knife an a gun. An apprehended violence order against him was granted shortly afterwards. "
  71. ↑ An ode to Adam Cullen. In: cashbrown.company of January 23, 2020.
    Original text: “Adam Cullen and I had an interesting relationship. At first we were friends, then lovers, then friends, then acquaintances. At times we were enemies. Adam made some lifestyle choices which at the time were incompatible with mine, so we went our separate ways. We had made collaborative works together, and despite our differences, Adam was very supportive of my work, and I of his. I made several portraits of him from 2004 - 2007, and it is during these years that we had the most contact. "
  72. ↑ Green Turtle Productions, Marcus Graham: Between Two Worlds (Trailer) on Vimeo , 2019, 3:11 min.
    Original text: "I chose [...] a life of [...] existential hillbilly-ing."
  73. ↑ Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
    Original text: "I fucking love the act of executing them."
  74. ↑ Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
    Original text: "Adjoining neighbor Leonie Lyall […] observed [him] shooting birds in the garden and clubbing a fox to death […]."
  75. ↑ a b Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
    Original text: “He set traps for animals, calling them 'soft' traps, enabling him then to kill the animals himself. There were quantities of dead animals, whole bodies, skins and various parts scattered throughout the cottage. In recent years the atmosphere of the house had become so offensive that Cullen refused to allow anyone inside. "
  76. ↑ Ashley Crawford: Adam Cullen. When the weird turned Pro. In: artcollector.net.au, 2005.
    Original text: “I do a lot of work for charities but it's almost always for environmental issues or animal causes. We're busy wiping out the environments animals live in and they don't have that much help. "
  77. ↑ Chopper unleashes a grim tale. In: The Age of May 20, 2002.
    Original text: [T] he result is not for the faint-hearted. A children's book it almost certainly isn't. A fable, in the tradition of dark and Gothic storytelling, it certainly is.
  78. ↑ Sean Nicholls, Emily Dunn: An 'X' and the reason why. In: Sydney Morning Herald, October 14, 2009.
  79. ↑ A $ / € - Reference value from June 30, 2011 - 0.737229 . In: Historical Exchange Rates, OFX.
  80. ↑ Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
    Original text: “Although the charge against Cullen was defended on the basis that he used his guns to create artworks, it is difficult to see how a Tazer [sic!] Might be used for this purpose. The thought lingers that it may have been to use on animals. "
  81. ^ A b c Joyce Morgan: 'All I was doing was making art. I am very, very scared. I have never hurt anyone, ever. ' In: Sydney Morning Herald of October 22, 2011.
  82. ^ Adam Fulton: Cullen aims for the brutal beauty of ballistics. In: Sydney Morning Herald of August 17, 2011. Quoted in: chalkhorseblog.com, 2011.
  83. ^ Artist's jail term suspended for DUI. In: Sydney Morning Herald, November 10, 2011.
  84. ↑ Joyce Morgan: Suspended jail sentence for award-winning artist. In: Sydney Morning Herald of November 11, 2011.
    Original text: “Magistrate Lee Gilmour said Cullen was an intelligent, artistic man. 'But there are things causing you pain mentally that you have not dealt with and you need to', she said. "
  85. ↑ a b Ashley Crawford: Adam Cullen. When the weird turned Pro. In: artcollector.net.au, 2005.
    Original text: “There is never, ever, anything straightforward about tackling Adam Cullen. He can be charming and prickly, beguiling and secretive, enthusiastic and aloof. He can be holed up in his cabin in the mountains, the phone cut off as bushfires circle the compound. Or he can be swanning through the Museum of Contemporary Art, charming the pants off curators and critics alike. I've seen him bewilder and charm artist Tim Storrier with his knowledge of firearms and beguile such writers as Catharine Lumby and Ingrid Periz with his witticisms. He happily holds his own in conversation with both the erudite Edmund Capon at the Art Gallery of New South Wales and the somewhat more down to earth Mark 'Chopper' Read in a down-at-heels pub in Collingwood. "
  86. ↑ Martin Edmond: declivities & eminences. Review of Erik Jensen's: Acute Misfortune. The Life and Death of Adam Cullen. In: Sydney Review of Books of September 30, 2014.
    Original text: “[N] o matter how far he went, there were those, like his parents, like Edmund Capon at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, who would not abandon him . "
  87. ↑ Catharine Lumby: Artist was drawn to darker side of human existence. In: Sydney Morning Herald of July 31, 2012.
    […] critics, who saw Cullen as nothing more than an attention-seeking enfant terrible whose major project lay in shocking the middle classes.
  88. ↑ Erik Jensen: Adam Cullen shot me in the leg and threw me from a motorbike - and it wrecked me when he died. In: The Guardian of September 15, 2014.
    Original quote: “Early on, he admitted the difficulties he had loving his mother, how he rejected the richness of her breast milk and felt this formed some glib epigraph to the relationship that followed. 'I just never took to the love of a mother', he said. 'I couldn't stomach it.' "
  89. ↑ Catharine Lumby: Artist was drawn to darker side of human existence. In: Sydney Morning Herald of July 31, 2012.
    Original text: “After his adored mother Carmel died in 2010, his father Kevin continued to love and support his son through his illnesses. His family was a large part of his life and he often expressed gratitude for having parents who encouraged his talent from a young age. "
  90. ↑ Erik Jensen: Acute Misfortune. The Life and Death of Adam Cullen. Black Inc., Carlton 2014, ISBN 978-1-86395-693-2 , p. 20.
  91. ↑ Erik Jensen: Adam Cullen shot me in the leg and threw me from a motorbike - and it wrecked me when he died. In: The Guardian of September 15, 2014.
  92. ^ A b Luke Buckmaster: 'Profoundly traumatic'. How Adam Cullen's story was retold for the screen. In: The Guardian of May 21, 2019.
  93. ↑ Erik Jensen: Adam Cullen shot me in the leg and threw me from a motorbike - and it wrecked me when he died. In: The Guardian of September 15, 2014.
    Original text: "... just before his death at 46, he confessed that he had spent his life a closet bisexual."
  94. ^ Transcript: Erik Jensen in conversation with Ramona Koval. In: The Monthly, 2015.
    Original text 1: “[…] in the drugs chapter, for instance, as we're traveling through drug deals and he's shooting up in his dealer's front room while a toddler's crying in front of TV and so on , I record those scenes, I think, with detail but I don't think I judge them. "
    Original text 2: Charles Bukowski in Barfly :" Anybody can be a non-drunk. It takes a special talent to be a drunk. It takes endurance. Endurance is more important than truth. "
    Original text 3:" [...] 'Endurance is more important than truth'. But what does it even mean? EJ: To Adam's mind, it was an excuse for everything. "
  95. ↑ Carolynne Skinner: Adam Cullen Artist 1965–2012. Adam we hardly knew you. In: Oz Arts Magazine, 2013.
    Original text: “Like Jackson Pollock, he discovered a new, exciting way to put paint on paper and canvas and did it better than anyone else. Like Pollock, he drove fast, he drove drunk. He not only loved life, he squeezed the life out of life. "
  96. ↑ Wendy Frew: Archibald winner and 'grunge' painter Adam Cullen dead at 47. In: Sydney Morning Herald of July 30, 2012.
    Original text: “Adam was the real deal. Even in the grips of a consuming illness, on a good day, he was one of the very best contemporary artists in Australia. Adam was astonishingly kind and the many hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars in paintings he donated to charity attest to his endless giving. "
  97. ↑ Tributes flow for Archibald winner Adam Cullen who has died at age 47. In: news.com.au of July 30, 2012.
    Original text: “He lived quite an extreme life. [...] The extremity of his practice wasn't a put-on, he lived the life he depicted. The fractured men in his paintings are as much a self-portrait as they were depictions of what was wrong in society. "
  98. ↑ Academics remember grunge artist Adam Cullen. In: The Conversation of July 30, 2012.
    Original text: "… his life had become a performance, sometimes distanced from others' realities."
  99. ^ Karl Quinn: 'Acute Misfortune' wins The Age Critics Award at MIFF. In: Sydney Morning Herald of August 11, 2018.
personal data
SURNAME Cullen, Adam
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Cillen, Adam Frederick (maiden name)
SHORT DESCRIPTION Australian painter and sculptor
DATE OF BIRTH October 9, 1965
PLACE OF BIRTH Sydney , Australia
DATE OF DEATH July 28, 2012
PLACE OF DEATH Wentworth Falls, Australia