Brendan Sullivan is a sculptor and painter whose work explores the evolving state of American masculinity, its rituals, traditions, and the tension between vulnerability and strength. Drawing from his own experiences as an athlete and manual laborer, Sullivan uses human and animal forms to question cultural expectations and ideals of endurance, pride, and identity.

Working primarily with discarded sports equipment, most often the exterior of balls, Sullivan repurposes their leather and stitching to create intricate, tactile surfaces that embody both history and transformation. These reclaimed materials, paired with wood, steel, foam, clay, bamboo, and other found elements, serve as metaphors for permanence and reinvention. His sculptures often balance monumentality with a quiet, human fragility, reflecting the complexities of contemporary masculinity and the mythology surrounding American strength.

Sullivan received his BFA in Studio Art, with a concentration in painting, from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, in 2014, and his MFA from the New York Academy of Art in 2018. His training in classical realist painting provided the technical foundation that informs his material experimentation in sculpture today. He has been awarded residencies and fellowships including the Terra Foundation for American Art/Claude Monet Foundation Residency in Giverny, France (2017), the Eric Fischl Artist-in-Residence Award at West Nottingham Academy (2024), and the 2025 Chubb Fellowship.

His work has been exhibited at Fountain Street Fine Art (Boston, MA), Bowersock Gallery (Provincetown, MA), Green Family Art Foundation (Dallas, TX) and Art Basel Miami. Sullivan lives and works in Massachusetts.