Artist: Douglas Coupland
Exhibition title: Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene
Venue: Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto, Canada
Date: February 7 – March 14, 2020
Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Daniel Faria Gallery is pleased to present Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, Douglas Coupland’s sixth solo exhibition with the gallery. The exhibition will present new works that examine humanity’s debris and its geological legacy as a species.
Fordite is a noun used to describe layered chunks of paint chiseled away by mineralogists from decommissioned 1960s- and 1970s-era automotive spray-painting booths, mostly in Michigan. It is also a material that offers us a charmed opportunity to witness our present as though it were the deep past. Fordite is intensely beautiful, and almost heartbreaking in its ability to compress and convey the moods and emotions of a long-lost era. It has become an expensive and highly coveted base material in the jewelry world. In many cases, the year and model of a specific car can be determined at a quick glance of a fordite nugget, particularly from the early 1970s, when vehicular paint palettes were at their historically most vibrant, with colours given upbeat names like ‘Vitamin C’ and ‘Purple People Eater.’
In one body of work Coupland takes the metal and fiberglass hoods from 1965-1975 muscle cars and through a complex painting process, mimics the look and feel of magnified fordite in an evocative manner that is both nostalgic and ominous. The viewer comes to realize that the very medium which makes these works so alluring is also, essentially, poison.
In a second body of work, the humble weather-beaten surfaces of industrial fishing floats recovered from Japanese tsunami clean-up missions on British Columbia’s western tideline are recontextualized. The application of a fordite-style veneer unexpectedly triggers uncomfortable questions about beauty, utility and environmental degradation. This work repurposes marine plastic debris first used by Coupland in a now dismantled 2018/19 exhibition at the Vancouver Aquarium, further reiterating our rapidly shifting attitudes towards the politics of disposability.
Douglas Coupland is a graduate of the Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design in Vancouver, as well as the Hokkaido College of Art and Design in Sapporo, Japan and the Instituto Europeo di Design in Milan, Italy. His work has been the subject of two major museum retrospectives: everywhere is anywhere is anything is everything at the Vancouver Art Gallery, the Royal Ontario Museum and the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art and Bit Rot at Rotterdam’s Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art, and Munich’s Villa Stücke. Vortex, Coupland’s installation in collaboration with Ocean Wise, opened at the Vancouver Aquarium in May 2018. He has exhibited in numerous international group shows including: The Extreme Present, presented by Gagosian and Jeffrey Deitch, Miami, 2019, 24/7: A Wake up Call for our Non-Stop World, Somerset House, London, 2019-2020, I Was Raised on the Internet, MCA Chicago, 2018 and Electronic Superhighway, curated by Omar Kholeif, Whitechapel Gallery, London, 2017. In 2019, Coupland co-curated the exhibition Age of You at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Toronto, with Hans Ulrich Obrist and Shumon Basar. His works will be included in Human Learning: What Machines Teach Us, opening February 2020 at the Canadian Cultural Centre in Paris, and an upcoming exhibition at The Sharjah Art Foundation, opening March 2020.
Coupland’s work can be found in the collections of the Vancouver Art Gallery (Vancouver), University of British Columbia (Vancouver), Museum of Canadian History (Gatineau), Glenbow Museum (Calgary), Agnes Etherington Art Centre (Kingston), the Albright Knox (Buffalo), and the Confederation Centre (Charlottetown). He is a member of the Royal Canadian Academy, an Officer of the Order of Canada, an Officer of the Order of British Columbia, a Chevlier de l’Order des Arts et des Lettres and receiver of the Lieutenant Governor’s Award for Literary Excellence.
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1972 Mach 2, 2020, Automotive paint on metal, 71 x 50 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1972 Mach 2, 2020, Automotive paint on metal, 71 x 50 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1972 Mach 2, 2020, Automotive paint on metal, 71 x 50 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1972 Mach 2, 2020, Automotive paint on metal, 71 x 50 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Naikoon River, 2020, Automotive paint on found items, 49 x 18 x 12 inches
Douglas Coupland, Naikoon River, 2020, Automotive paint on found items, 49 x 18 x 12 inches
Douglas Coupland, Naikoon River, 2020, Automotive paint on found items, 49 x 18 x 12 inches
Douglas Coupland, Naikoon River, 2020, Automotive paint on found items, 49 x 18 x 12 inches
Douglas Coupland, Naikoon River, 2020, Automotive paint on found items, 49 x 18 x 12 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1968 Mustang, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 54 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1968 Mustang, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 54 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1968 Mustang, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 54 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1968 Mustang, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 54 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1968 Camaro, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 53 x 45 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1968 Camaro, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 53 x 45 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1968 Camaro, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 53 x 45 inches
Douglas Coupland, Tlell River, 2020, Automotive and acrylic paint on found items, 35 x 14 x 7 inches
Douglas Coupland, Tlell River, 2020, Automotive and acrylic paint on found items, 35 x 14 x 7 inches
Douglas Coupland, Tlell River, 2020, Automotive and acrylic paint on found items, 35 x 14 x 7 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1968 Shelby GT500, 2020, Automotive paint on metal, 54 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1968 Shelby GT500, 2020, Automotive paint on metal, 54 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1968 Shelby GT500, 2020, Automotive paint on metal, 54 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1968 Shelby GT500, 2020, Automotive paint on metal, 54 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1970 GTO, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 62 x 54 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1970 GTO, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 62 x 54 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1970 GTO, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 62 x 54 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1970 GTO, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 62 x 54 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1969 Mustang, 2019, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 58 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1969 Mustang, 2019, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 58 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1969 Mustang, 2019, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 58 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1969 Mustang, 2019, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 58 x 47 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Rose Spit, 2020, Automotive and acrylic paint on found items, 38 x 14 x 8 inches
Douglas Coupland, Rose Spit, 2020, Automotive and acrylic paint on found items, 38 x 14 x 8 inches
Douglas Coupland, Rose Spit, 2020, Automotive and acrylic paint on found items, 38 x 14 x 8 inches
Douglas Coupland, Skidegate, 2020, Automotive and acrylic paint on found items, 31 x 11 x 12 inches
Douglas Coupland, Skidegate, 2020, Automotive and acrylic paint on found items, 31 x 11 x 12 inches
Douglas Coupland, Skidegate, 2020, Automotive and acrylic paint on found items, 31 x 11 x 12 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1972 Barracuda, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 59 x 53 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1972 Barracuda, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 59 x 53 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1972 Barracuda, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 59 x 53 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite 1972 Barracuda, 2020, Automotive paint on fiberglass, 59 x 53 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Tooth of Dog, 2020, Acrylic on canvas, 31 x 31 inches
Douglas Coupland, Defrag, 2020, Acrylic on canvas, 31 x 31 inches
Douglas Coupland, Punk Tooth of Dog, 2020, Acrylic on canvas, 31 x 31 inches
Douglas Coupland, Echo Chamber, 2020, Acrylic on canvas, 31 x 31 inches
Douglas Coupland, Registration, 2020, Acrylic on canvas, 31 x 31 inches
Douglas Coupland, Facial Calibration, 2020, Acrylic on canvas, 31 x 31 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, Echo Chamber, 2020, Acrylic on canvas, 31 x 31 inches
Douglas Coupland, Razor Wire, 2020, Acrylic on canvas, 31 x 31 inches
Douglas Coupland, Condensation, 2020, Acrylic on canvas, 31 x 31 inches
Douglas Coupland, Chopped Defrag, 2020, Acrylic on canvas, 31 x 31 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto
Douglas Coupland, 1982, 2019, Acrylic on linen, 42 x 50 inches
Douglas Coupland, The New Stone Age, 2019, Acrylic on linen, 20 x 24 inches
Douglas Coupland, Los Angeles, 2019, Acrylic on linen, 24 x 20 inches
Douglas Coupland, Fordite: Neominerology in the Anthropocene, 2020, exhibition view, Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto