Description: Surface and abyss, lust for life and the transience of youth: these are some of the qualities that make Billy Sullivans color-filled intimate, sensual and minutely observed paintings, drawings and photographs of his friends, family, lovers and muses and their worlds so riveting. Since the early 1970s Sullivan has chronicled New Yorks underground art and fashion scene with his camera, translating the images into oil paintings, pastel drawings and elaborate multi-part slideshow installations. For this extensive monograph, Sullivan sequenced the images non-chronologically into a series of visual chapters, placing his photos alongside his paintings and drawings. Sullivans work rivets in its painstaking observation of casual beauty, desire and love in its every facetbetween family members, lovers, acquaintances and kindred spirits. Art critic William J. Simmons places Sullivans oeuvre in art historical context and writer Linda Yablonsky explores Sullivans personal life. Sullivan (b. 1946) has exhibited internationally since 1971 with works in collections of MoMA (NY ), The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Denver Art Museum and others.
