Nicola Tyson

In both her paintings and drawings Nicola Tyson strikes an intriguing balance between the abstract and figurative. Her figures combine elements of both the comic and the grotesque; they possess a primal energy, but their strength is often undercut by a sense of vulnerability. In her portraits the objective head and shoulders shots of the passport booth are rendered subjective via the expressive distortion of their features. Limbless, bizarrely proportioned figures, at once amorphous and angular emerge as sexualized beings.

Within the paintings strident tones seem to be Tyson’s main means of articulating psychological depth, but within the black and white drawings it becomes plain that form plays an equally significant role. Their automatic aspect forges links with the surrealists, a link extended further via the sexual edge and psychological bent that underscores both the drawings and paintings. 

1960 Born in London. Lives and works in New York

1979-80 Chelsea School of Art, London
1980-81 St Martin’s School of Art, London
1986-89 Central St Martin’s School of Art, London

Solo Exhibitions

2006 Friedrich Petzel, New York
2005 Sadie Coles HQ, London
Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin (cat.)
2003 Heads, Friedrich Petzel Gallery, New York
Oeuvres Récentes, Galerie Nathalie Obadia, Paris
2002 Friedrich Petzel Gallery, New York
2001 Galeria Camargo Vilaca, São Paulo, Brazil
2000 Galerie Nathalie Obadia, Paris
1999 Sadie Coles HQ, London
Friedrich Petzel Gallery, New York
1998 Galerie Natalie Obadia, Paris
Kunsthalle, Zurich (cat.)
1997 Friedrich Petzel Gallery, New York (cat.)
1995 Anthony D’Offay Gallery, London
Entwistle Gallery, London
Friedrich Petzel Gallery, New York
1993 Trial Balloon, New York

Group Exhibitions
2007 The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, Galleri Faurschou, Copenhagen
2006 Drawn into the World, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Chicago (IL)
2005 Slice of Life, Austrian Cultural Forum, New York
2004 Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy, London (cat.)
Sexy Beasts 1963 – 2004, Ethan Cohen Fine Arts, New York
Esprit, Galerie Nathalie Obadia
2002 Gallery Swap – Sadie Coles HQ, Sommer Contemporary, Tel-Aviv, Israel
Statements (six), Dornbracht, New York
2000 Hoxton HQ, Sadie Coles HQ at Hoxton House, London
Drawing on the Figure: Works on paper from the Manilow collection,
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (IL)
Greater New York, P.S.1 Contemporary Art Centre, New York
Galerie Nathalie Obadia, Paris
Blurry Lines, John Michael Kohler Art Center, Sheboygan (WI)
Full Serve, Rove, New York (curated by Kenny Schacter)
1999 New Work: Painting Today – Recent Acquisitions, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco (CA)
What Big Is, Geoffrey Young Gallery, Great Barrington (MA)
1998 Pop Surrealism, Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield (CT)
Drawings IV, Koplin Gallery, Los Angeles (CA)
Some Women/Pretty Girls, Florida Atlantic University, Ritter Art Gallery (FL)
Chaos, Control, Chaos, Control. You Like? You Like?, Elias Fine Art, Boston (MA) (curated by Anne Lemieux)
1997 Recent Acquisitions, The Museum of Modern Art, New York
Project Painting, Basilico Fine Arts and Lehmann Maupin Gallery, New York (cat.)
Best of the Season, Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield (CT)
Package Holiday: Works by British Artists in the Ophiuchus Collection, Hydra Workshops, Greece (cat.) (curated by Sadie Coles and Pauline Karpidas)
New Work: Drawings Today, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco (CA) (curated by Janet Bishop and Gary Garrels)
Drawings…an annual bi-coastal invitational, Meyerson and Nowinski,
Seattle (WA)
1996 Psycho-morphing, Caren Golden Fine Art, New York
1995 Works on paper: Paul Myoda and Nicola Tyson, Friedrich Petzel Gallery, New York
In a Different Light, University Art Museum, Berkeley (CA) (curated by Nayland Blake and Lawrence Rinder)
1994 The Unsuccess Story, 479 Broome Street, New York (curated by Kenny Schachter)
Petzel/Borgmann Gallery, New York
I Could Do That, 109 Greene Street, New York (curated by Kenny Schachter
Part FANTASY, University of British Columbia, Vancouver & The University of Manitoba, Winnipeg
1993 The Return of the Cadavre Exquis, The Drawing Centre, New York
part FANTASY, Jack Hanley Gallery, San Francisco (CA)
1992 part FANTASY, Trial Balloon, New York
1991 Queer, Minor Injury, New York
1990 Milch Gallery, London
1989 The Whitechapel Open, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London
1988 The Whitechapel Open, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London

Public Collections

Tate Gallery, London
San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco (CA)
Walker Art Centre, Minneapolis (MI)
Museum of Modern Art, New York
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia (PA)
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (IL)
National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington DC
Corcoran Museum of Art, Washington DC
Weatherspoon Art Gallery, Greensboro (NC)
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C.