May 20th, 2025 — June 17th, 2025

CLOUD PAINTING

Dries Van Noten is delighted to present an exhibition by Peter Sutherland at The Little House.

Cloud Painting by Peter Sutherland showcases an exciting new body of work created between 2024 and 2025.

Peter Sutherland’s work comes from a need to document the world around him — not the world that’s curated, but the raw, in-between spaces that are often overlooked. Sutherland is drawn to everyday objects, natural landscapes, and the marks people leave behind, whether through graffiti, architecture, or movement.
Photography was Sutherland’s first tool, but over time he found ways to push beyond its limits, using sculpture, collage, and installation to break down and rebuild the way we see familiar places. He is interested in the tension between nature and the manmade — the friction where the wild meets the urban. A lot of Sutherland’s inspiration comes from the cultures that raised him: skate-boarding, biking, graffiti —communities that value spontaneity, grit, and freedom over polish or perfection.

After relocating from New York City to a mountain town in Colorado, Sutherland’s practice evolved as he began exploring these themes through new mediums such as painting, drawing, and collage. In Cloud Painting, his abstract works are built up with paint rollers, layered gradually like his large scale collages. Fragments — photographs, found images, stickers, and drawings — are scattered and then assembled in a deliberate yet chaotic harmony. His sculptures, composed of casual elements transported from his studio into the gallery space, preserve the raw spirit of his work, embracing accident, texture, and imperfection.

At its core, Sutherland’s work is about capturing the overlooked — the beauty of the everyday and the fleeting moments that often pass us by.

ABOUT PETER SUTHERLAND

Peter Sutherland (b. 1976, Ann Arbor, Michigan) lives and works in Salida, Colorado. Select solo exhibitions include Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis; White Cube Gallery, London; Galerie Rodolph Janssen, Brussels; Bill Brady KC Gallery, Kansas. Sutherland’s work has been featured in a number of group exhibitions, including the Journal Gallery, New York; Museum Dhont-Dhaenens, Lys, Belgium; and Nahmad Contemporary, New York.
Alongside his visual art, Sutherland has a background in filmmaking. His documentary PEDAL (2001) was shown at the Sundance Film Festival. He also worked as director of photography for Stoked (2003), a documentary about skateboarder Mark “Gator” Rogowski.

INTERVIEW OF PETER SUTHERLAND

CAN YOU DESCRIBE YOUR CREATIVE PROCESS FROM THE INITIAL IDEA TO THE FINISHED PIECE?

I’ve been obsessively making art for a long time, so it doesn’t feel like there is a beginning and end to the process. I listen to music, sometimes make music, use my art materials to alter my clothing, I photograph my life and family in a way that blends everything together. I feel lucky to be able to live this way.

⁠IF YOU HAD TO DESCRIBE YOUR ART STYLE IN WORDS, WHAT WOULD THEY BE?

I want it to be a chaotic celebration of life. I lean into curiosity and experimentation as a foundation for all art making. In the literal sense most of my work starts off with photography and it continues and is edited from there.

⁠WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE PIECE YOU’VE EVER CREATED AND WHY?

For me it’s been cool to scale up my collage works for this show. I’ve been working with collage for about 10 years but never at this scale. I can include other collages, sketches, entire photographs, etc. The pieces feel like they breathe more.

⁠CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THE IMPORTANCE OF COLOR, TEXTURE, AND SPACE IN YOUR WORK?

When the pandemic started I moved to the countryside, this marked a new time without my community from NYC and mainly just my family. This work is personal in the sense that I wasn’t interrupted with city life and just really got to take time and try new things.

WHAT WAS THE MOST CHALLENGING PIECE YOU’VE EVER CREATED?

They are all challenging. I approach it maybe how designers do, I just want each piece to look resolved, or so unresolved that it has some sort of energy.

HOW DO YOU SEE THE CONNECTION BETWEEN YOUR ARTWORKS AND DRIES VAN NOTEN?

I like a lot of color, seldom do I take a monochrome photo. Like people that work with clothing I’m always open to inspiration, from the past and present and mixing them and seeing what comes out. I’m also inspired and involved with photographing some fashion and some skateboarding, I know there is a shared passion for those things between us.

WHO ARE SOME ARTISTS THAT INSPIRE YOU? AND WHY?

There are so many, Sterling Ruby, Mark Flood, Pushead, Cady Nolan, younger LA artists like Mario Ayala. I like a lot of these artists because I get a sense of the person behind the work they are creating. It’s like watching a film and slowly learning about a character.