Donald Sultan is a painter, printmaker and sculptor whose still life paintings feature semi-abstract compositions made with unique materials such as tar, spackle, enamel, Masonite, and vinyl floor tiles. In order to create his minimalist renderings of flowers, fruits, and other natural forms, Sultan began experimenting with non-traditional painting methods in the 1970s and he rose to prominence as part of the “New Image” movement in New York City. This era of late 70s American abstraction included painters who employed a figurative style, often with Post-Pop cartoon-like imagery along with highly emotive neon colors. Sultan chooses subjects that are from everyday life and typically seen in traditional still lifes, such as flowers, fruits, and trees, and he reduces them to their elemental shapes. The artist says, “I try to pare down the images to their essence, and capture the fleeting aspect of reality by pitting the gesture against the geometric—the gesture being the fluidity of the human against the geometry of the object.” 

An off-white satin paper fills the background of circular black blooming flowers. This black and white contrast creates the impression of the print being simultaneously abrupt and serene. From a series the artist labeled his “artificial paintings,” swirls of thin black paint mimic a flower’s soft petals, in full bloom. These blooms and their leaves are flattened onto the canvas and carefully arranged in a pattern. To the far left is a thin, delicate cursive writing that reads “Black Flowers, Donald Sultan.” Depictions of tulips, mimosa trees, poppies, and camellias permeate Sultan’s works. His intention is for us to look again at what is too often overlooked, asking us to reconsider what we see in our daily visual field. Sultan’s prints were featured in the 2017 British Museum exhibit The American Dream: Pop to Present, which featured many established printmakers. 

Born in Asheville, North Carolina, Sultan studied at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill and later received his MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Sultan’s work belongs in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago; the Museum of Modern Art; the Tate; the Guggenheim Museum; the Whitney Museum of American Art; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo; Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University; High Museum of Art, Atlanta; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC, among others. He has also exhibited in solo and group shows at the British Museum, London (2017); Royal Academy of Arts, London (2017); Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (2000); Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (1988); the Museum of Modern Art, New York (1988); Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (1987); Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (1987); and the Whitney Museum of American Art (1979), among others. Sultan lives and works in New York City.