Artist: Jason Dodge

Sylvia Kouvali presents new work by American artist Jason Dodge (b. 1969, lives in Møn, Denmark). This marks the artist’s first exhibition in London since 2008 and his first with the gallery.

Jason Dodge’s sculptures are not defined by formal transformation, but rather by the repositioning of recognisable materials through acts of selection, displacement, and framing. A central concern in his practice is how things appear in states of suspension: materially modest yet conceptually charged, where meaning is neither fixed nor fully accessible. Rather than functioning as autonomous forms, the works operate as traces.

Attentive to the physical specificity of materials, Dodge works with things from the world that undergo only subtle shifts. These materials are placed in new relationships, developing in relation to their surroundings, architecture, and atmosphere. These materials are not transformed beyond recognition; instead, they are placed in new relationships, where their presence can be felt differently, whilst simultaneously carrying their own histories and associations, moving across and through one another.

Language often operates alongside the objects, not as explanation but as a parallel site of ambiguity. Treating words as material in their own right, titles, statements, lists, and anecdotal fragments introduce narrative possibilities that remain deliberately inconclusive, functioning like poetic fragments.

Since 2012, Dodge has run the poetry imprint Fivehundred Places, a small press dedicated to publishing single-author collections by contemporary poets. This publishing practice extends and reflects his artistic work, which often draws on the sensibility of poetry, emphasising absence, suggestion, and the open production of meaning and interpretation.

To accompany Dodge’s solo exhibition at Grazer Kunstverein in 2024, Tom Engels wrote, “It can be useful to think of Jason Dodge’s work as tuning. Tuning isn’t just about a single answer. It’s the subtle pulse, the quiet moment of alignment, a dialogue with the complexity of a system. It’s where metal meets method, where tension hovers at the edge of precision, and everything is poised for a breakthrough. Strings stretch, wires hum, circuits connect—each one a thread in the tapestry of potential.

Tuning isn’t just adjustment; it’s the skill of bringing order to chaos and chaos to order, of finding the perfect balance where the ordinary fractures into brilliance. Tuning is the space between frequencies, where accuracy meets challenge, where every shift aligns with the mechanics of the system, turning the mundane into something exceptional. It’s the art of reading the language of the universe, where every variable is a word, every adjustment a phrase.”

This exhibition follows recent presentations of Dodge’s work at Kunsthalle Friart Fribourg, Grazer Kunstverein in Austria, and MUDAM Luxembourg. Dodge will also be participating in the forthcoming edition of Manifesta 16.

Additional selected solo exhibitions include Museum für Gegenwartskunst Siegen, Siegen, Germany (2022); Museum of Contemporary Art (MACRO), Rome, Italy (2021); Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, (Rivoli), Torino, Italy; Fondazione Morra Greco, Naples, Italy (2019); The University of Chicago, USA (2018); Schinkel Pavillon, Berlin, Germany (2017); Institut d’Art Contemporain Villeurbanne/Rhône-Alpes, Villeurbanne, France (2016); American Academy in Rome, Rome, Italy (2013); Kunstverein Nürnberg, Nürnberg, Germany (2012); MCA - Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Chicago, USA (2011); Kunstverein Hannover, Hannover, Germany (2010); Kunstverein Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf, Germany (2009); The David Roberts Art Foundation, London, UK (2008).

Selected group exhibitions include Museion, Bolzano, Italy (2024); Jeu De Paume, Paris, France (2022); Museo di Palazzo Mocenigo, Venice, Italy (2022); Tai Kwun, Hong Kong (2020); MCA Chicago,
USA (2019); Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna, Austria (2019); Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, USA (2018); Centre Pompidou-Metz, Metz, France (2018); KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin, Germany (2017); MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, USA (2017); Centre d’édition Contemporaine, Genéve, Switzerland (2016); Liverpool Biennial, Liverpool, UK (2016); Witte de With, Rotterdam, The Netherlands (2014); MUDAM - The Contemporary Art Museum of Luxembourg, Luxembourg (2013); 55th Biennale di Venezia, Lithuanian Pavilion, Venice, Italy (2013); Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt am Main, Germany (2011); Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, Rivoli, Italy (2010); Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, USA (2009); Kadist Art Foundation, Paris, France.