IN THE NEWS:
“Geopolitical Performance,” BMore Art, October 17, 2018
"Artist's Spotlight: Brian Dailey's WORDS," Fathom Magazine, March 2018
"Dupont Underground continues to offer dialogue & intrigue," Modern Luxury DC, December 2017
"Examining What Truly Matters: The Art of Paula Ballo Dailey," East City Art, Spring 2017
"To Look Is To Think: A Conversation with Brian Dailey," ASAP/Journal, Vol. 2, No. 1 (January 2017)
"Brian Dailey: Challenging Our Instincts," The Georgetowner, March 24, 2016
"Brian Dailey Shows Bulgaria in Colour," Europost, July 10, 2015
"Declassified: American artist Brian Dailey unravels paradoxes in Sofia," Europost, October 17, 2014
"PARTY ANIMALS: Photographer Brian Dailey zooms in on voters,” Village Voice, October 10, 2012
LECTURES / EVENTS
Artist’s Talk, Baahng Gallery, November 8, 2018
WORDS Installation Gallery Talk, American University Museum, February 17, 2017
Millennium Arts Salon, March 18, 2016
FotoTalk, FOTODC, November 8, 2015
Stories of Art and Money, Panelist, Freer Sackler, May 16, 2015
Midnight Moment, Times Square, February 1-28, 2014
Politics in Perspective, The Phillips Collection, November 2, 2012
ABOUT
Perhaps no word better characterizes Brian Dailey (b. 1951) than polytropos, the first adjective Homer applies to Odysseus in The Odyssey. Translated from the Greek as “well traveled,” “much wandering,” and, in a more metaphorical sense, as “the man of many twists and turns,” polytropos suitably describes Dailey’s life journey and its many peregrinations. As a student at Otis Art Institute (MFA, 1975) and in his ensuing art career in Los Angeles, Dailey participated in the pioneering creative experimentation defining the prolific artistic milieu in California in this era. His early career launched him on a path that—before bringing him full circle back to his roots as an artist—took him through a twenty-year interlude working on arms control and international security. These unusual experiences, which he approached with the same curiosity that has driven his art, provide a fertile source of inspiration in his idiosyncratic creative practice. As the artist states:
There is art in politics and politics in art. Throughout my life two passions stimulated my curiosity: art and international politics. The tension between two interests generated my intense inquiry into these seemingly diametrically opposed professional fields. In the context of my career, the wanderings through a labyrinth of artistic and intellectual encounters provided a lifetime of eclectic experiences, which, in turn, supplied a bounty of material for my art.
With two-and-a-half decades of in-depth engagement with the issues my current work addresses, I am able to explore them with direct experience and knowledge. In that context, I am exploring the legacy of my odyssey in government and business as a way to relate those experiences to contemporary social and political issues and as a means through which to create contemplative works of art.
Based in the Washington DC metropolitan area, Dailey is an artist whose work in a range of media, including photography, film, installations, and painting, draws on his multifaceted life experiences. His conceptual and performance based art expands the parameters of the mediums in which he works, defying easy categorization. Engaging with the social, political, and cultural issues of our times, his work is informed by his unusual background and unconventional evolution as an artist.