MARK BRADFORD

‘The Hunt of the Unicorn’ tapestry cycle, thought to have been woven in the Netherlands at the turn of the 15th Century, illustrates in rich detail the story of a band of hunters and hounds in pursuit of a unicorn and its eventual capture and death.

The tapestry paintings sit on walls covered in a monumental site-specific paper work, and black globes with bleach-burnt continents hang from the ceiling, creating celestial shards of natural light emerging from a skylight above.

An additional site-specific work entitled ‘The Map of Hell’ (2023), inspired by a Botticelli illustration depicting the ‘Divine Comedy’, is installed in the stairwell leading down to the main gallery space, a journey reminiscent for Bradford of Virgil’s descent into the bowels of hell. Bradford frequently responds directly to the specificities of the spaces in which he exhibits, interventions that add to the immersive and experiential nature of the work.

Mark Bradford (b. 1961 in Los Angeles; lives and works in Los Angeles) is a contemporary artist best known for his large-scale abstract paintings created out of paper. Characterized by its layered formal, material, and conceptual complexity, Bradford’s work explores social and political structures that objectify marginalized communities and the bodies of vulnerable populations. Just as essential to Bradford’s work is a social engagement practice through which he reframes objectifying societal structures by bringing contemporary art and ideas into communities with limited access to museums and cultural institutions.