Rudy Shepherd’s work explores the nature of evil through the mediums of painting, drawing and sculpture. This exploration involves investigations into the lives of criminals and victims of crime. He explores the complexity of these stories and the grey areas between innocence and guilt in a series of paintings and drawings of both the criminals and the victims, making no visual distinctions between the two. Going along with these portraits is a series of sculptures called the Black Rock Negative Energy Absorbers. They are a group of sculptures meant to remove negative energy from people allowing them to respond to life with the more positive aspects of their personality.
Growing out of this exploration for solutions to the overwhelming forces of negative energy has come a series of ceramic sculptures called the Healing Devices and a series of paintings of Holy Mountains, sacred spaces from all over the world that are central to the religions and cultures of the world and a series of live performances featuring a character he have created called The Healer.
Rudy Shepherd received a BS in Biology and Studio Art from Wake Forest University and an MFA in Sculpture from the School of Art Institute of Chicago. He has been in solo exhibitions at Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, CT, Latchkey Gallery, NY, Mixed Greens Gallery, NY, Smack Mellon, Brooklyn, NY, Regina Miller Gallery, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA and group exhibitions at MoMA PS1, NY, The Studio Museum in Harlem, NY, Bronx Museum of Art, NY, Art in General, NY, Triple Candie, NY, Socrates Sculpture Park, NY, Cheekwood Museum of Art, TN, Contemporary Museum, Baltimore, MD, Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, CT, Southeastern Center of Contemporary Art, NC, Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago, IL, Tart Gallery, San Francisco, CA and Analix Forever Gallery, Geneva, Switzerland. He has been awarded Artist in Residence at PS1 National/International Studio Program, PS1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City, NY, Artist in Residence Visual + Harlem, Jacob Lawrence Institute for the Visual Arts, New York, N, Emerging Artist Fellowship, Socrates Sculpture Park, Long Island City, NY, Artist in Residence, Location One, NY, Process Space Artist in Residence Program Governors Island, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, New York, NY. He has done public art projects on the campus of Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, Penn State University, PA at Socrates Sculpture Park, Long Island City, NY, First Street Green Art Park, New York, NY and the Three Rivers Arts Festival, Pittsburgh, PA and in Harlem in collaboration with the Studio Museum in Harlem.
He is currently represented by Kates-Ferri Projects, NYC