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Sandow Birk (born 1962 in Detroit, raised in Southern California) is an American visual artist from Los Angeles, whose work deals mainly with contemporary American culture. Seven books have been published on his works and he has made two films. With an emphasis on social issues, his frequent themes have included inner city violence, graffiti, various political issues, travel, prisons, surfing and skateboarding. His projects are often elaborate and epic in scale, including a series on "The Leading Causes of Death in America" and the invasion and the second war in Iraq]]. Most recently he has completed an entirely hand-made illuminated manuscript version of the Holy Qur'an, transcribing the entire English language text by hand in a personalized font based on graffiti, and illuminating the pages with scenes of contemporary American life. ==Career== Birk is a graduate of Otis Art Institute of Parsons School of Design (now Otis College of Art and Design) in Los Angeles. His studies included a semester in Paris at the American College in Paris and Parson's School of Design, as well as a semester at the Bath Academy of Art in England. Further studies included time at the Museu de Arte Moderna and Parque Lage in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. In 2000, Birk exhibited an epic, pseudo-historical series entitled "In Smog and Thunder”, describing a "Great War of the Californias" in which Los Angeles and San Francisco wage all-out war for control of California, at the Laguna Art Museum. The series imagined an epic civil war between Los Angeles ("Smog Town") and San Francisco ("Fog Town"), and included some 200 drawings, maps, installations, models, and paintings with such titles as "The Great Battle of Los Angeles".〔Duncan Campbell, ("A brush with the past: The paintings of Sandow Birk ), ''The Guardian'', December 2, 2000.〕 A book was published on the project, "In Smog and Thunder", and a faux documentary film about the war was made with the same name and directed by Sean Meredith, with voice over work by Paul Zaloom. His series of idyllic landscape paintings of every one of California's 33 state prisons was exhibited at the Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum in 2001. A book has been published on the project, entitled ''Incarcerated: Visions of California in the 21st Century''. In 2002, Birk expanded this project by depicting all of New York State's maximum security prisons in the style of Hudson River School artists from the 19th century. The project was exhibited in New York at Debs and Co. Gallery and works from the series are included in the collection of the New York Historical Society. In 2005, Birk collaborated with writer Marcus Sanders on a rewriting and illustrating of the entirety of Dante's ''Divine Comedy'',〔Robert L. Pincus, ("Forging 'links'" SDMA project prompts Sandow Birk to find kindred artistic spirits from years past" ), ''San Diego Union-Tribune'', May 29, 2005.〕 in which Dante and Virgil wander among the souls of the afterworld and discuss faith and philosophy with historical figures. The 13th century poem was translated into contemporary American English by Sanders, while Birk provided illustrations that adapt Gustave Dore's classic illustrations into 21st century imagery. Birk's illustrations were exhibited at the San Jose Museum of Art in 2005 and traveled to several institutions. The work was later published in three volumes. A feature film adaptation of the Dante project, entitled ''Dante's Inferno'' was made by Birk and Sanders in collaboration with Paul Zaloom, Sean Meredith, and Elyse Pignolet. Starring the voices of Dermot Mulroney and James Cromwell as Dante and Virgil respectively, the film was featured at film festivals across the United States in 2007, garnering awards for "Best Director" at the Silverlake Film Festival and "Audience Favorite" at the San Francisco Independent Film Festival a.k.a. IndieFest. In September 2009, Catharine Clark Gallery showed ''American Qur'an'', an exhibition of fifteen suras of the Qur'an which Birk inscribed in English and decorated with contemporary American scenes. That project was expanded and exhibited in several institutions, including the Koplin del Rio Gallery in Los Angeles, P.P.O.W Gallery in New York City, and the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh. The exhibition from the Warhol later traveled to several institutions, including Grinell College in Grinell, Iowa. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Sandow Birk」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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