Dennis Dread spends his evenings hunched over a drawing table in a fetid crypt conjuring the dead and howling at the moon! A self-taught American artist with roots deeply entrenched in the fertile compost of transgressive art, his visceral and obsessively detailed ballpoint pen drawings regularly appear on album covers worldwide. Born in a bathroom in 1972 in New York's folklore-rich Hudson River Valley, near influential historical locales such as Sing Sing Prison and Sleepy Hollow, he enjoyed a childhood of monster movies and homemade comics and at the age of 18 began silkscreen printing for the infamous t-shirt company Mutilation Graphics. Dread proudly held this post for four years while working on his drawing skills and studying literature and comparative mythology at a nearby State University. Following several cross-country drawing sprees, Mr. Dread jumped off a freight train passing through Portland, Oregon, and the "city of thorns" has served as his headquarters ever since. A freelance culture terrorist, Dread edits and self-publishes the long running underground art zine Destroying Angels and curates the acclaimed annual group exhibition Entartete Kunts. Who will survive and what will be drawn for them?
Public Exhibitions
- Entarete Kunts III (curated), The Life Gallery (Portland, Oregon) 6/2009
- Demonik! Grotesk!, Knark Art Gallery (Dresden, Germany) 8/2008
- Entarete Kunts II (curated), Optic Nerve Gallery (Portland, Oregon) 6/2008
- Zombies Attack Again!, MF Gallery (Manhattan, New York) 4/2008
- Entartete Kunts (curated), Optic Nerve Gallery (Portland, Oregon) 6/2007
- Spill the Beer of Christ!, Optic Nerve Gallery (Portland, Oregon) 6/2006
- Halloween Show, MF Gallery (Manhattan, New York) 9/2006
- Zombies Attack!, MF Gallery (Manhattan, New York) 1/2006
- Candy Apples & Razorblades, Counter Media (Portland, Oregon) 10/2005
- Heathen Art, Optic Nerve Gallery (Portland, Oregon) 8/2005
- Intermission, Optic Nerve Gallery (Portland, Oregon) 12/2004
- Live By The Pen, Die By The Sword, Medusa Gallery (Portland, Oregon) 5/2002
- Invasion Of The Monster Men, Gallery Bink (Portland, Oregon) 10/2001