Michael de Courcy (artist)

Michael de Courcy (born 1944) is a Canadian multi-disciplinary artist.[1]

Michael de Courcy
Born (1944-08-03) August 3, 1944
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
NationalityCanadian
EducationEcole des beaux-arts de Montreal and Vancouver School of Decorative and Applied Arts (1970)
Alma materEmily Carr University of Art and Design
Known forPhotography and printmaking
Websitemichaeldecourcy.com

Biography

Michael de Courcy was born August 3, 1944 in Montreal, Quebec.[2] He completed his formal education at Ecole des beaux-arts de Montreal[3] and Vancouver School of Decorative and Applied Arts (1970).[4] He lives and works in Vancouver, British Columbia.[1]

Career

In the late 1960s de Courcy joined the Intermedia Society,[3] an artist collective active in Vancouver, British Columbia from 1967 to 1972.[5] He was one of its core members, creating an extensive, photo-based project that evolved into The Intermedia Catalogue.[6][7]

His work has been exhibited in Canada and internationally[3] including the Museum of Modern Art, NYC, the Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography, Ottawa and the Vancouver Art Gallery.[6] He has lectured and participated in workshops at the University of British Columbia, Emily Carr University of Art and Design, the York University, the University of Windsor, and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.[3][6]

Significant works

de Courcy's 100 randomly stacked photo-boxes Untitled (1970), was presented in the Museum of Modern Art's Photography into Sculpture (1970) exhibition.[8] He was one of two Canadians out of 23 artists who participated in the exhibition.[9] In Mary Statzer's book "Conversation with the Curator, Peter Bunnell said, "...Michael's whole point was that the placement was random. Those boxes had a different image on each side. One fellow liked the black image, so he stacked the boxes so that that one was facing out."[10] de Courcy's Boxes were part of the Photography into Sculpture international traveling exhibition.[11] The exhibition was a traveling exhibition from 1970 to 1972, traveling to Vancouver Art Gallery in 1971.[12] Photography into Sculpture also traveled to the Krannert Art Museum, the Menil Collection, the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Otis College of Art and Design in LA, the Fort Worth Museum of Modern Art, and the Phoenix Art Museum.[13]

In 1972 de Courcy, Taki Bluesinger, Gerry Gilbert and Glenn Lewis created a photo-mapping project, Background / Vancouver. There were three walking loops through Greater Vancouver, which began and ended at Victoria Square. The walks took place simultaneously and included New Westminster, North Vancouver, Burnaby and West Vancouver. The resulting photographs numbered 360 creating a 360-degree city view.[14][15][16]

In 1975 de Courcy along with two assistants painted arrows on the streets in Vancouver marking three walks downtown from the Artist's Gallery to downtown to the West End, to Victory Square and to False Creek in preparation for the Urban Wilderness exhibition.[17]

Collections

His photographs are included in the collections of the Vancouver Art Gallery and the National Gallery of Canada.[2][3]

References
  1. "Artist/Maker name "De Courcy, Michael"". app.pch.gc.ca. Government of Canada. Retrieved June 28, 2019.
  2. "People / Michael de Courcy". vancouverartinthesixties.com. 60s Ruins in Process: Vancouver Art in the Sixties. Retrieved June 29, 2019.
  3. "88 Artists from 88 Years – An Alumni Retrospective". ecuad.ca. Emily Carr University of Art + Design. October 25, 2017. Retrieved June 29, 2019.
  4. "The Refeatured Landscape: Embodied Approaches to the Imaging of the City". Decoy Magazine. 2014. Retrieved June 30, 2019.
  5. "Background / This Place – Upcoming Panels & Talks". grunt.ca. grunt. 2013. Retrieved July 1, 2019.
  6. "the intermedia catalogue". intermedia.vancouverartinthesixties.com. The Michael de Courcy Archive. Retrieved July 2, 2019.
  7. Photography into Sculpture, Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved August 18, 2019
  8. "Michael deCourcy". moma.org. The Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved June 29, 2019.
  9. Statzer, Mary (2016). The Photographic Object 1970. University of California Press. p. 25. ISBN 978-0-520-28147-9. Retrieved June 29, 2019.
  10. "Michael de Courcy's Boxes at the New Era Social Club". intermedia.vancouverartinthesixties.com. The Michael de Courcy Archive. 1970. Retrieved June 30, 2019.
  11. Vancouver, Art and Artists, 1931 – 1983. Vancouver Art Gallery. 1983. p. 276. ISBN 9780920095003. Retrieved June 30, 2019.
  12. ""Photography in Sculpture" at Cherry and Martin". Contemporary Art Daily. 2011. Retrieved July 2, 2019.
  13. Lowndes, Joan (1974). "city by mural". The Vancouver Sun. Retrieved June 30, 2019.
  14. Price, Gorden (2012). "Vancouver: October 30, 1972". pricetags.ca. Retrieved July 1, 2019.
  15. "BACKGROUND / VANCOUVER : AN ARTIST'S VIEW OF THE CITY, OCTOBER 30, 1972". michaeldecourcy.com. Retrieved July 1, 2019.
  16. Griffin, Kevin. "Michael de Courcy: journeys through Vancouver's urban wilderness". The Vancouver Sun. Retrieved June 29, 2019.

Further reading
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