
Devan Shimoyama
Devan Shimoyama was a resident of The Cabin LA in June of 2017. In the following year his career began to truly take off with a solo institutional show at The Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Throughout his art, Shimoyama explores Black queer masculinity ⎯ both in and of itself and as something that is specifically desirable. His use of mixed media ⎯ often including glitter, pieces of jewelry, sequins, and rhinestones, creates a textured (and glimmering) surface that reminds the viewer of the very real tactile body which Shimoyama’s works portray. We can see in Brandon a clear example of Shimoyama’s interest in unconventional materials, physicality, and identity. While some of Shimoyama’s pieces are more mythological in subject than this, Brandon still possesses an other-worldly ethereal quality. The subject’s face seems to be fading out of sight behind the thin layer of paint spread across it while their eyes and tears burst forth from their body ⎯ projecting out towards the viewer in a way that is both compelling and uncanny. Shimoyama is represented by De Buck Gallery and Kavi Gupta Gallery.