The originals of both his first Yes logos, eleven of his album covers, the record labels, as well as the prototype of his Sea Urchin Chair, first exhibited in London's Design Centre, can be found in the permanent collection of London's Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A).
With more than one hundred million copies of his images sold worldwide, from album covers to posters, cards, calendars, and books there is no doubt that Dean helped define a generation. Considered by some to be one of the most influential artists of the past century, not only inspiring many other artists worldwide, but influencing much of the media, such as Disney, the original Star Wars trilogy and of course the much publicised film, Avatar. His work has been exhibited in many galleries and museums around the world, including London’s The V & A, The Royal Academy, The Royal College of Art, The Institute of Contemporary Art and The NY Cultural Centre in New York. In 2010, the Daelim Contemporary Art Museum in Seoul, South Korea, held a major retrospective of his work, attracting many visitors from all over Asia.
Dean’s achievements include being awarded a silver medal from the Royal College of Art, an Honorary Doctorate from the San Francisco Academy of Art University, an Honorary Fellowship by the Arts Institute of Bournemouth and more recently receiving a Gold Badge of Merit by the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors.
Impressively, Dean has been granted the rare privilege of his work being commemorated through a series of UK postage stamps as well as being awarded a Great Britain status in a 2017 government campaign by 10 Downing Street, acknowledging his outstanding creative talent.
In 2019, Roger Dean collaborated with Creative Director Pierpaolo Piccioli (named by Time Magazine in 2019 as one of the top 100 most influential persons in the World) from leading International Fashion House Valentino, with Dean’s paintings chosen as the inspiration for their Spring/Summer 2020 Men’s Prêt á Porter collection! With over two million of his books sold, Dean’s work is chronicled in three volumes: Views (1975), Magnetic Storm (1984) and Dragons Dream (2008), with a fourth book currently in development. Reluctant to part with any of his original artwork, and only producing perhaps four major paintings a year, it is only relatively recently that he has allowed some of his original pieces to be sold, making his work not only attractive but highly collectable.
"Imaginative landscapes - exotic utopias, indeed - created by artist Roger Dean, who designs the elsewhere, many elsewheres, in bright colors onto surfaces, materializing imagined places, making them visible, hence real." - Valentino, 2019