Chuck Sperry

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Thank You for Sharing an Incredible 2024 • Year In Review

Photo: Shaun Roberts

HAPPY NEW YEAR! I would like to give all my friends and supporters a heartfelt thank you for sharing an incredible 2024, full of amazing events and watershed achievements! 

2024 bore witness to San Francisco’s warm welcome of my work as I received a lifetime membership to the de Young and Legion of Honor Museums in appreciation for works which rest in their permanent collection. Additionally, the de Young and Legion of Honor Museum Stores now carry “Color x Color” – which is available at the link below. 

SIGNED Color x Color at Museum Stores

Artist Chuck Sperry at the Art of Noise exhibition at SFMOMA. May 2024. Photo: Shaun Roberts.

The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art brought my work into their permanent collection and showed these pieces in “The Art of Noise” exhibition through spring and summer. It’s thrilling to receive this institutional acknowledgement.

Opening reception. “Home Show” a Chuck Sperry retrospective at The Haight Street Art Center, San Francisco. On view from October 17th through November 24, 2024. Photo: Shaun Roberts.

Meanwhile, in my neighbourhood of the Haight-Ashbury I received three shows across the year: “My Minds Eye” at Psychedelic SF Art Gallery, “Home Show: A Chuck Sperry Retrospective” at the Haight Street Art Center, and The Rock Poster Society, Festival of Rock Posters which I never miss at the Hall of Flowers in Golden Gate Park. All three shows were hearty reminders of my love of the city and a celebration of the living soul of San Francisco.

Packed house at Harman Projects for Chuck Sperry’s April opening of “Only Human” in New York City.

Feeling buoyed by hometown acceptance, Harman Projects launched my exhaustive solo show “Only Human” in art capital New York City, and followed with Art On Paper NYC. It was amazing to see everyone in New York City share in such an amazing celebration!

Europe called again with “Popland 4” at KochxBos Gallery, curated by amazing French artist Ciou in Amsterdam. “Only Human” solo travelled to L’Oeil Ouvert Gallery in Paris, where Beaux Arts Magazine dubbed my show one of the top five most captivating shows in the art capital of Europe. Both shows made waves on both sides of the Atlantic.

I finished the year with a solo at L’Oeil Ouvert, Paris – “Future In The Balance” which is on view until January 31 with work available through the gallery at the link below. I’m happy to report that my solo received major attention, listing on The City of Paris’ official event website, Sortir a Paris among other notices, and even took to the airwaves on OUI FM. See the link below for my available works.

AVAILABLE WORKS at L’Oeil Ouvert, Paris

I teamed up with Vote Equality, Spoke Art and The Roxie Theater to produce a benefit screening of RATIFIED, a film documenting the struggle for ERA. My poster was made the official movie poster while this spirited and important film moves into distribution and streaming next year.

I’m thrilled my work showed with Harman Projects at CONTEXT Art Miami during Art Basel, Miami Art Week – and in appreciation of San Francisco love, a very limited Artist Edition of 100 “Home Show” posters is available now by joining Harman Projects EQL launch below.

HOME SHOW EQL LAUNCH

Also there are a very limited number of my iconic “Joy” and “Pneuma” wood panels which were shown in Miami and are available through Harman Project’s CONTEXT Art Fair exhibition viewing room – see link below.

AVAILABLE WORKS HARMAN PROJECTS AT CONTEXT

I am so very grateful for an outstanding year and the support of the museum teams, gallery teams, volunteers, friends who showed up to help carry the day, and friends and supporters who came to share and revelled in the joy and love of creative energy. I’m heartened by our human family, and encouraged by your emotion, soul, light and laughter. Here’s to 2025! Please take care of each other and assert your human spirit!

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France’s Beaux Arts Magazine: Sperry “Top 5 Most Captivating Exhibitions in Paris”


Only Human
A solo exhibition by Chuck Sperry
Online Release

I would like to thank my friends and supporters who attended my Paris opening on June 1. What a memorable evening! The prestigious Beaux Arts magazine described the show as one of the “top five most captivating exhibitions in Paris.”

In celebration of my legendary expo in Paris, we are making a very special, limited online release of archive prints, rare test prints, canvases, and panels.

ONLINE RELEASE

 

5 most captivating exhibitions to see in the galleries in Paris in June
By Malika Bauwens

Summer has already started in our Parisian galleries with a great harvest of exhibitions. Since entry is free, why deprive yourself of it? We have selected some exhibitions for you to discover with eyes wide open this month of June.

Spotlight on the artistic and cultural events not to be missed in the galleries in Paris in June 2024. In this program that we have put together for you: classic painting but also installations, photography and sculpture, created by current art talents.

It is also an opportunity to make some discoveries such as admiring rare Italian masters or the works of an American star of screen printing… Some galleries will close their doors for the summer break in a few weeks: remember the dates carefully, so as not to miss these exhibitions!

4. Chuck Sperry, master of American screen printing at the L’Oeil Ouvert gallery:

In the United States, he is a king of screen printing. An iconic American artist, living between San Francisco and here in Grasse, Chuck Sperry (born in 1962) has  caught the eye of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) which houses in their collection his ultra-colorful and psychedelic art. A defining figure in the concert poster field (he’s made posters for The Who, The Black Keys, Nick Cave, Joan Jett, PJ Harvey, Bob Dylan…), the master fuses rock energy and traditional printing methods.

Presented for the first time in France by the L’Oeil Ouvert gallery, Sperry is indeed an eye-grabber!

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SFMOMA Opens “Art of Noise” May 4 • Sperry On View

SFMOMA Art of Noise
“The Black Keys” SFMOMA selection of Sperry concert poster for its permanent collection

SFMOMA Opens Art of Noise May 4

Art of Noise • SFMOMA • May 4 – August 18, 2024
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
151 Third Street • San Francisco, CA 94103

Art of Noise at SFMOMA is a multi-sensory love song to the designers who devote their artistic vision to music. 

Music is a part of our daily lives. By contemplating how music is amplified by art — the design of album covers and concert posters — SFMOMA’s upcoming exhibition Art of Noise shows us how profoundly this art has shaped our experience of the rhythms and melodies we listened to for over 100 years.

SFMOMA Art of Noise
“Bob Dylan” SFMOMA selection of Sperry concert poster for its permanent collection

A floor-to-ceiling “temple” of music design — including many hundreds of San Francisco’s psychedelic rock posters — will feature rock poster artists and legendary bands of every description. Mid-century modern album covers, as well as hip-hop, punk, and rave flyers complete this expansive display of incredible color and creativity.

Art of Noise is not to be missed by any fan of art and music! This massive exhibition celebrates the icons of concert posters including Victor Moscoso, Wes Wilson, Chuck Sperry, David Singer, Lee Conklin, Bonnie MacLean, Milton Glaser and many others. 

SFMOMA Art of Noise
“Edward Sharpe” SFMOMA selection of Sperry concert poster for its permanent collection

Art of Noise is organized by SFMOMA and curated by Joseph Becker, associate curator of architecture and design, with Divya Saraf, curatorial assistant in architecture and design.

The exhibition opens Saturday, May 4 at the museum. You can learn more about this amazing exhibition by following the link below.

LEARN MORE

SFMOMA Art of Noise
“Power to the Peaceful” SFMOMA selection of Sperry concert poster for its permanent collection

 

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Sperry Enters Permanent Collection of SFMOMA

Clockwise from top left: Bob Dylan, Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros,
The Black Keys and Power to the Peaceful by Chuck Sperry

I’m very proud to announce that San Francisco Museum of Modern Art has acquired a selection of my concert posters for its permanent collection. The museum will include my work in its upcoming exhibition Art of Noise opening May 4, 2024. This exhibit should not be missed! It is a must-visit for every poster fan, all my friends, and supporters!

Here, briefly what the museum says about the exhibition:

Music is amplified by great design, from the concert posters that paper bedroom walls to the Sony Walkmans and Apple iPods once carried in our pockets. Through over 800 works, Art of Noise explores this essential relationship and the ground-breaking designs that enrich our collective memory, touching all our lives and giving form and color to sound. Heavily drawn from SFMOMA’s collection, the works on view include over 500 concert posters and flyers, 150 record album covers, 100 design objects, and three sound installations that chart the evolution of music-centered design over the past 100 years. Enter the exhibition’s “temple” to music graphics where hundreds of psychedelic rock posters extend from floor to ceiling, highlighting San Francisco’s integral role in the 1960s and ‘70s scene and the artwork that turned it up.

You can learn more about this amazing exhibition by following the link below.

Art of Noise is organized by SFMOMA and curated by Joseph Becker, associate curator of architecture and design, with Divya Saraf, curatorial assistant in architecture and design.

Art of Noise • May 4 – August 18, 2024
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art 
151 Third Street • San Francisco, CA 94103

LEARN MORE

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Sperry in “Get with the Action” Exhibit at San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

SFMOMA Chuck Sperry

I am very proud my poster “This Is Our City And We Can Shut It Down” is now being exhibited at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

Get with the Action
Political Posters from the 1960s to Now
September 16, 2017–Spring 2018

Bursting into the public realm in the mid-1960s, the protest poster has been used all over the world to incite change and empower the voice of the people. This exhibition presents the political poster as a powerful tool for organizing and activating communities in response to some of the most pressing issues over the past 50 years, from the Civil Rights and Anti-War movements to social justice, immigration, environmental causes, and more.

Get with the Action, a title taken from a screenprint by the artist and progressive activist nun Corita Kent, explores the medium of the poster as a communication device — one intended to be publically displayed, produced en masse, and often ephemeral — to inform and energize a wide audience. The works on view, focused on the creative output of the Bay Area and beyond, highlight the power of applied graphic design and its utility in presenting information while rallying citizens around a cause.

Curated in three rotations over six months, each presentation of Get with the Action calls attention to SFMOMA’s commitment to graphic design and to the continually relevant, if not urgent, movements of our time.

Read more about Chuck Sperry & his newest art book here

Archives

Sperry Books: “Color x Color” • “Helikon” • “Chthoneon” • “Idyllion”

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