G.S. Bullen

GS Bullen is a prolific Philadelphia-based artist, novelist, and photographer raised along the East Coast and in Belgium. In visual art, Bullen primarily creates paintings, favoring large canvases for striking abstracts and faux naïf figures. They communicate very honestly with the canvas as a medium, freely utilizing the bare white surface to create space or highlights. The art is quite necessarily painting. Bullen uses the brushstroke directly, without any artifice, and is not concerned with imparting a sense of realism. However, the simplicity conceals an eye for complex composition, using a variety of line weights, shapes, and brush applications for the most impactful and gestural result. Hues are uncomplicated; Bullen freely uses color-blocking with a straightforward palette. When blending, they usually do so in a larger block of color to texturize a certain element of the composition, so the rare moments of irregular blending and blur impart intense, dynamic impact. Bullen uses text lyrically, commensurate with their experience as a writer, contextualizing certain pieces with a blunt directness that cuts through any pretense.

Neo-expressionist in style, pieces each focus on a distinct theme or moment, articulating the idea through wild, unrestrained figures and the presence of the larger canvas. While much art of this movement deals in political themes, Bullen’s work is highly personal. Informed by their life experience across multiple homes and careers, Bullen imparts an intense worldliness, wisdom, and self-awareness to their art. Free of commercial concerns, they have described their own work as scientific in the way it attempts to examine the human experience. By simplifying the colors, removing ambiguity with text, and being intentional with composition, Bullen is able to control their variables as they create expressive works to understand the inner workings of the mind. This process results in dynamic and gestural works where each brushstroke evidences an inquisitive artist, eager to share their perspective as much as search for answers.