Biography
Sam Cornish and Jeff Lowe have organised an appreciation of Michael on the Abstract Critical web site. It has notes written by Lee Tribe and Bill Tucker: HERE
Michael Bolus
(1934-2013)
Born in South Africa, Michael Bolus settled in England in 1957 and studied at St Martin's School of Art from 1958 to 1962. After a brief period living in Cape Town he returned to London in 1964 to begin a teaching post at St Martin's and the Central School of Art and Design. Bolus had his first UK solo exhibition at Waddington Galleries in 1968.
As a student his earliest work was modelled or sculpted in stone, but Bolus soon abandoned these traditional techniques in favour of working with steel and aluminium, materials that allowed him to explore the notions of balance and the extension of form which had long interested him. For the New Generation show in 1965 he exhibited a series of polychromatic sculptures taking the form of abstract shapes cut out of sheet aluminium and placed flat on the ground. A slightly earlier example of this group of works is the triangular piece, 9th Sculpture, 1963. However in the 1970s his sculpture left the ground, becoming more fragmented and making use of lattice and grid-like constructions that defy gravity, such as Untitled Sculpture No. 3, 1974 and Untitled, 1981.
Michael Bolus is represented in public collections around the world, including:
- The National Gallery of Art, Washington DC
- The Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, Lisbon.
- The Art Gallery of New South Wales.
- Tate, London.
- Museum of Modern Art, New York
- Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
- MUseum MOderner Kunst, Vienna
- Graves Gallery, Sheffield
- Arts council Collections, UK
- NewArtCentre, Roche Court, Salisbury
Group exhibitions:
- 2019 “Objects of Wonder: British Sculpture 1950 – Present” PalaisPopulaire Berlin.
- 2008 New generation revisited: British sculpture from the sixties and seventies, a tribute to Bryan Robertson at the Whitecha - New Art Centre, Salisbury (England)
- 1999 Centro de Arte Moderna - CAM - Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian Linhas de Sombra - Centro de Arte Moderna - CAM - Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon
- 1997 Centro de Arte Moderna - CAM - Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian A Ilha Do Tesouro/Treasure Island - Centro de Arte Moderna - CAM - Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon
- 1989 Britannica: Trente Ans de Sculpture - Museum voor Hedendaagse Kunst Antwerpen (MuHKA), Antwerp
- 1988 Britannica: Trente Ans de Sculpture - Musée d'art moderne André Malraux (MuMa), Le Havre
- 1983 Skulptur und Farbe - 4. Bremer Skulpturenausstellung - GAK - Gesellschaft für Aktuelle Kunst e.V. Bremen, Bremen
- 1979 Contemporary Sculpture from Collection - MoMA - Museum of Modern Art, New York City, NY
- 1975 The Condition of Sculpture - Hayward Gallery, London (England)
- 1969 Ars 1969 Helsinki' 'International Exhibition of Contemporary Art'. The Art Museum of Ateneum, Helskini
- 1968 New British Sculpture - Arnolfini, Bristol (England)
- 1966 Primary Structures: Younger American and British Sculpture - The Jewish Museum of New York, New York City, NY
- 1965 The New Generation - Whitechapel Gallery - London.
- One Man Exhibitions:
- South African Association of Art, Cape Town, 1964:
- Waddington Galleries, London, 7 Sep 1965 – 2 Oct 1965
- Kornblee Gallery, New York, 1966
- Waddington Galleries, London, March, 1968
- Waddington Galleries, London, 12 January - 7 February 1970
- Waddington Galleries, London, 3 - 27 March 1971
- Waddington Galleries, London, 30 September - 25 October 1975
- Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 7 Aug 1999 – 24 Oct 1999