Richard Dupont
Richard Simmons DuPont Jr. is a postdigital American artist and educator whose installations, sculptures, paintings and prints examine the social implications of 21st century digital technology. He has been a member of the faculty at School of Visual Arts since 2015.
Early life and education
DuPont was born October 5, 1968 in New York City, to Richard Simmons DuPont Sr., a private investor of the Du Pont family, and Emily T. Frick. His mother would later marry Henry [Clay Frick II] and become chair of the Frick Collection. He is a direct descendant of Éleuthère Irénée du Pont, founder of the Du Pont Company.He received an AB degree from the Departments of Visual Art and Art and Archeology at Princeton University in 1991.
Artistic practice
A pioneer in the field of Digital Art, Dupont began using scanners and 3D printing in 2002 to capture and replicate distorted images of his body. Dupont had his whole body scanned at a General Dynamics facility on The Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in 2004. Dupont's work examines the degree to which the primacy of the human gesture has been radically altered by the onset of digital technology. He also uses his art to interrogate expressions of power and control, and to examine how anthropometry, the Victorian science of mapping the body, has morphed over the past century into biometrics.Exhibitions and awards
In 2005, Dupont was invited to present a solo project at Art Basel Miami in the Art Positions sector. In 2008, Dupont was commissioned by The Lever House Art Collection to present a major installation at Lever House. The installation was widely acclaimed. Between 2008 and 2015, Dupont's work was exhibited at The Middlebury College Museum of Art, The Flag Art Foundation, The Queens Museum, The Museum of Arts and Design, The Cleveland Museum of Art, The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, The Powerhouse Museum, and The Underground Museum, Los Angeles. In 2014, Dupont was awarded the Museum of Arts and Design Visionary Award.In 2024, Richard Dupont's work was included in Every Sound Is a Shape of Time: Selections from PAMM's Collection, curated by museum director Franklin Sirmans at the Pérez Art Museum Miami alongside the artworks by other sixteen artists from the institution's holdings.
Collections
Dupont's works are included in the collections of The [Museum of Modern Art], New York; The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Museum of [Fine Arts, Boston], Massachusetts; Pérez Art Museum Miami, Florida; The Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio; The Brooklyn Museum, New York; The Hammer Museum, California; The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, California; and the New York Public Library print collection. among others.Personal life
On July 27, 1997, DuPont married Lauren Martinez, the daughter of Arthur C. Martinez, former chair and chief executive of Sears, Roebuck & Co, of Chicago, Illinois. They have two daughters and a son;- Lila Francis DuPont
- Ava Martinez DuPont