Dan Devening

Dan Devening is a Chicago-based artist, educator, curator, gallerist, and writer. He is currently Professor, Adj. at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and was Senior Lecturer in the Department of Art Theory and Practice at Northwestern University from 1993 to 2008.

His paintings, works on paper, and installations have been exhibited extensively, including recent shows in New York at Geary Contemporary, Launch F18, Apex Art, and Printed Matter, Inc.; in Chicago at 65Grand, LVL3, Heaven Gallery, Autumn Space, ebersmoore gallery, Roy Boyd Gallery, and Julius Caesar; and in Los Angeles at Kinkead Contemporary, among other national venues. His recent international projects include exhibitions in Germany at the Kunstmuseum Ahlen, Galerie Grölle in Wuppertal, Kunstverein Recklinghausen, the Museum Kurhaus in Kleve, dok25A in Düsseldorf, Renate Schroeder Gallery in Cologne, and galerie oqbo, Schau Fenster, Scotty Enterprises, and Neues Problem in Berlin. He has also exhibited work in Vienna, Austria; Brussels, Belgium; Tokyo, Japan; Toronto, Canada; Monterrey, Mexico; Melbourne, Australia; and Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Devening has curated exhibitions both nationally and internationally, including projects at galerie oqbo in Berlin, dok25A in Düsseldorf, Hagiwara Projects in Tokyo, the Hyde Park Art Center, and the Block Museum of Art in Chicago, among many others.

He recently completed the installation of a major public art commission for the CTA Irving Park Blue Line train station.

His essays have appeared in several recent publications, including Out of Place: Artists, Pedagogy and Purpose, edited by Zoë Charlton and Tim Doud; Clay Pop: What’s New in Clay, in a chapter on the work of Wade Tullier; and Where the Echo Drifts, an essay on the work of Leipzig artist Dagmar Varady, published in Expanded Studio by Snoek Publishing.

He is a MacDowell, Yaddo and Dora Maar Cultural Center Fellow and has received grants from the Hallie Ford Family Foundation; the Illinois Arts Council; the National Endowment for the Arts; and the MacArthur Foundation (International Connections), among others.

Devening founded and currently owns and directs Devening Projects, a gallery featuring exhibitions by emerging and established contemporary artists. He is the former co-director of Paris, London, Hong Kong in Chicago.