TitleGreen Tunnel
Artist
Jane Dickson
(American, b. 1952)
Date2004-2013
MediumOil on astroturf
DimensionsUnframed: 40 × 106 in.
SignedSigned on verso, lower right canvas: "JD '04-14"
SubmissionNA diploma presentation, June 3, 2015
Credit LineNational Academy of Design, New York, NY, Gift of Marie and David Dixon
Object number2015.1
Label TextJane Dickson has been making works since the 1970s that explore the mystery, alienation and bleakness of America’s nightlife. Her subjects have included Times Square peep shows and porn parlors, scenes of Las Vegas, American highways and suburban homes, which she paints onto unusual surfaces such as Astroturf, sandpaper, carpet or vinyl in order to exploit the textural possibilities of these materials. Green Tunnel is typical of many of Dickson’s works of the last two decades that depict spaces at the margins of the city like tunnels, bridges and gas stations. The viewer becomes the driver in Green Tunnel, and all other human presence from much of Dickson’s earlier works is gone. The Astroturf on which Dickson paints intensifies both the reality of the physical surface of the work, and that of the rough urban milieu that she has made her subject matter for decades. This work was exhibited in the Academy’s 189th Annual exhibition, where it won the 2015 National Academy Award for Excellence in the category of Painting.
