| ARTIST BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH: | A year after Calgary-born artist Mark Dicey graduated from the Alberta College of Art (1983), he opened Sure Art Installations which he continued to run for decades. He also taught as a sessional instructor at his alma mater (2003 – 2007) while pursuing his vocation: the creation of vibrant, colour-saturated paintings.
Describing some of his abstract art as arising from “an on-going journey for many years” and numerous influences, Dicey says, “the basic drive is my personal response to colour, form, shape, line, marks and texture (surface) that are taking place. Instinctively I build and respond to a piece that is being developed—a give and take; an on-going evaluation and assessment of what I am seeing and experiencing on the chosen format (paper or canvas).”
Dicey has mounted dozens of solo exhibitions in Calgary, including forming at the Javis Hall and Directions of Thought at the Paul Kuhn Gallery, and installations such as dr(aw)ummingsequence*2001* at the STRIDE Gallery and Jump at the Calgary Centre for the Performing Arts. A range of Canadian and international private, corporate, and public collections house Dicey’s work, including those of the City of Calgary and the Alberta Foundation for the Arts. The City of Calgary commissioned him to produce a banner for its 16th Avenue Urban Upgrade Project (2010) and Alberta Views Magazine and Moleskin have each reproduced his work; Feedback Zine featured one of Dicey’s pieces for its cover.
In addition to having received grants from the Alberta Foundation for the Arts and the Canada Council, Dicey won an Alberta College of Art + Design Alumni Award of Excellence (2002). |