Mark Cullen was born in Dublin in 1972. Cullen works with various media as an artist, curator and a cultural instigator.
In 1996 he was the co-founding partner of Pallas Studios, Dublin which later became Pallas Projects/Studios. Pallas through their various guises and programmes have been key exponents of experimental art practice in Dublin. Cullen is currently the co-director and co-curator of PP/S.
In 2007 he was co-editor of the ICAD gold award winning Pallas Heights 2003 – 2006, published to mark the activities of Pallas Heights in a Dublin City Council apartment block that was scheduled for demolition. Pallas Heights was a local and international programme of exhibitions and projects in the semi derelict housing block that enlivened and engaged the Irish art scence at from the edges of society during the Irish economic boom.
Pallas have worked with many collaboraters and partners over the years. In 2005 Cullen co-curated Offside and Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane. This exhibition of Irish and international artists programmed the entire ground floor of the museum and two offsite spaces including Dublin City Councils Civic Offices six storey atrium. In 2006 we collaborated with Irish Museum of Modern Art on their All Hawaiin Entrees Lunnar Reggae exhibition, addressing the popular Playstation 2 Pro-Evolution Soccer: with MAIM XI – in which the source code of the popular game was hacked to replace the pitch of the game with the cobbled courtyard of the museum and the players with the faces of local and international artists.
From 2005 – 2007 he was the International Representative of Visual Arists Ireland. During his time as the International Representative he was the first Irish representative at the 16th General Assembly of the Internation Association of Art held at Beijing Biennial, China in 2005. He represented the VAI at The World Summit on Arts and Culture held in The Sage Gateshead, NewcastleGateshead, UK 2006.
Cullen was curator of Darklight Digital Film Festival from 1999-2004. Darklight was a ground breaking festival that foregrounded digital film making and the use of cutting edge digital technologies in the creation and mediation of art, such as photomontage, web-art, video installation and online distribution. During this time he worked with many award winning international artists and film makers such as Desperate Optimists, Al and Al, Ben Pruskin, and Cleary and Connolly to curate and present new works to Irish audiences and audiences online.
As a practicing artist he was artist in residence in the School of Physics, University College Dublin in 2013 – 2014 and exhibited Mandala: As within so without, in the O’Brien Science Centre, UCD in November 2014 – June 2015.
Group shows include in 2015: Welcome Disturbances, The Lab, Dublin, (cat), Cosmic Dust, Visual, Carlow, Lacuna 3, Taylor Galleries, Dublin and XL Group Exhibition, Dublin (cat) in 2014
Works include ARK, Dublin Contemporary, MAIM XI for Irish Museum Modern Art, Temporary Portable Reservoirs at The Hugh Lane Municipal Gallery, Dublin and Siege House, London, Cosmic Annihilator, an installation at Pallas Heights and Open EV+A (curated by Dan Cameron) Limerick City Gallery.
Works in 2010 – 2014 include MAD Art Fair Madrid, curated by Jim Ricks, Carpet, Difference Engine: Accumulator II, Oriel Myrrdin Gallery, Wales, Probe, Difference Engine: Accumulator, West Cork Arts Centre, Ark: I could sleep for a thousand years, Dublin Contemporary, Ladies and Gentlemen we are floating in space, Triskel, Cork, Temporary Portable Reservoirs, Dorm, Model, Sligo, and Difference Engine, Substation, CSV Cultural Centre, New York, Wexford Arts Centre, The Black Mariah, Cork & SOMA, Waterford. He has several works in the Collection of the Office of Public Works, and is also included in the Chamber of Commerce Collection in the City of Hefei, China.
Since 2009 he is a member of Difference Engine – a self determined art group which instigates an evolving exhibition methodology, a model of artist self organisation, with artists Wendy Judge, Gillian Lawler & Jessica Foley, featuring Gordon Cheung and Paul Green.
In 2005 he completed a Masters in Visual Arts Practices at DLIADT and was an award winner at EV+A 2005. In 2007 he attended a residency at El Levante in Rosario and at CASLEO Observatory, Argentina.
In 1993 he was the Student Union President of the Crawford College of Art & Design. During his term there he was influential in the adoption of new media practices by curating and coordination the first Hands 2 Feet Live Art festival in Cork City.
Mark Cullen 