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Nina Chanel Abney

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Nina Chanel Abney
Born1982 (age 41–42)
Harvey, Illinois, United States
NationalityUnited States
EducationAugustana College
Alma materParsons School of Design
Websitewww.ninachanel.com

Nina Chanel Abney (born 1982) is an American artist, based in New York. She was born in Chicago, Illinois.[1] She is an African American contemporary artist and painter who explores race, gender, pop culture, homophobia and politics in her work.

Her work uses symbols and bright colors to present new ways of approaching loaded topics as she invites viewers to draw their own conclusions.[2] Blending the playful and the serious, Abney has said that her work is “easy to swallow, hard to digest.”[3]

Abney does not plan ahead, rather she works intuitively and with a rhythm. Jeffery Deitch once compared her skill to Haring.[4]

Education

Abney attended Augustana College in Rock Island, Illinois and received a BFA with a dual major in studio art and computer science in 2004. Abney then received an MFA at the Parsons School of Design[5] in 2007.

Career

In 2007, Abney got her first big break for her painting Class of 2007, which she painted for her MFA thesis show.[6] The painting is a diptych. In one panel, she is depicted as a blonde officer carrying a gun. In the second panel, her MFA classmates, all white, are painted as black inmates in orange uniforms. The painting was purchased by the Rubell family, owners of the Rubell Family Collection in Miami, Florida.[5]

She is best known for her colorful graphic large-scale paintings, four of which are included in the 30 Americans exhibition organized by the Rubell Family Collection of works by African American artists of the last three decades, which has toured museums and galleries in America since 2008.[7][8] Her work has also appeared in the Whitney Museum, the Jack Shainman Gallery, as well as the Kravets Wehby Gallery[9] in Chelsea.[10][11]

Dirty Wash was Abney's first show, hosted at Kravets/Wehby gallery in the spring of 2008. Attracting many major collectors, the show sold out within days.[12]

Nina Chanel Abney has been a lecturer for universities and visual arts centers across the nation. In 2013, she was a guest lecturer at the New York Academy of Art and in 2015 she presented at the Summit Series in Utah.[13]

Her first solo exhibition in a museum, Nina Chanel Abney: Royal Flush, opened at the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina in February 2017.[3][14] Curated by Marshall N. Price, the exhibition included about 30 of her paintings, watercolors, and collages and spans 10 years of her work.[3] The works contain a wide range of art historical references, including medieval icons, Northern Renaissance still lifes, and artists such as Henri Matisse and John Wesley.[5] They illustrate narcissism, celebrity culture, the objectification of women, issues of race, and police brutality.

In September of 2018, Abney curated a group exhibition at the Jeffery Deitch gallery entitled Punch. The exhibition called upon current socio-political issues. The exhibition featured Abney herself and some of her close friends. There were paintings, photographs and sculptures included in the exhibition.[15]

Countless news sources have discussed Abney's attempts to address radical political topics by blending genders and race.[16] Some of these sources include the Huffington Post, Forbes and Elle Magazine.[13]

Exhibitions

  • I Dread To Think, 2012 [17]
  • Always a Winner, 2015 [18]
  • Royal Flush, 2017[19]
  • Fair Grounds, 2017 [20]
  • Safe House, 2017 [21]
  • Seized the Imagination, 2017[22]
  • Hot to Trot. Not., 2018[23]
  • Chicago Cultural Center, 2018[19]
  • Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles & California African American Museum, 2018[19]
  • Neuberger Museum of Art, Purchase College, 2019[19]

Collections

Her work is included in the collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art.[24]

Books

  • Nina Chanel Abney: Royal Flush. Duke University, 2017. By Marshall N. Price. ISBN 978-0-938989-41-7.

References

  1. ^ McVey, Kurt. "How Nina Chanel Abney is Championing the Black Lives Matter Movement with a Paintbrush". Vanity Fair. Retrieved 2017-02-06.
  2. ^ "Nina Chanel Abney - 3 Artworks, Bio & Shows on Artsy". www.artsy.net. Retrieved 2017-07-08.
  3. ^ a b c "Nina Chanel Abney: Royal Flush". Nina Chanel Abney: Royal Flush. Retrieved 2017-07-08.
  4. ^ Zara, Janelle (2018-10-05). "'People are sometimes mad at me': behind Nina Chanel Abney's provocative art". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2019-05-04.
  5. ^ a b c Lori Waxman (28 February 2018), "The relevant, unpleasant, overwhelming magic of Nina Chanel Abney", Chicago Tribune, retrieved 18 March 2018
  6. ^ Backstory: Nina Chanel Abney Revisits Her First Major Painting, ‘Class of 2007’, Culture Type, retrieved 18 March 2018
  7. ^ Nina Chanel Abney, Rubell Family Collection, retrieved 7 December 2016
  8. ^ 30 Americans, Rubell Family Collection, retrieved 7 December 2016
  9. ^ "Kravets Wehby Gallery - Homepage".
  10. ^ Kurt McVey (15 October 2015), "How Nina Chanel Abney Is Championing the Black Lives Matter Movement with a Paintbrush", Vanity Fair, retrieved 7 December 2016
  11. ^ Ryan Steadman (3 November 2015), "Powerful Political Art: Nina Chanel Abney's Black History Paintings", The Observer, retrieved 7 December 2016
  12. ^ "Young Artists: Nina Chanel Abney", W Magazine, 2 November 2008, retrieved 18 March 2018
  13. ^ a b "Nina Chanel Abney - Jack Shainman Gallery". www.jackshainman.com. Retrieved 2019-05-04.
  14. ^ "Nina Chanel Abney Royal Flush". brooklynrail.org. Retrieved 2017-07-08.
  15. ^ "Reginald Sylvester II, GucciGhost & More Acclaimed Artists Take Part in "Punch" Exhibit". HYPEBEAST. Retrieved 2019-05-03.
  16. ^ "Last stop on national tour, Nina Chanel Abney: Royal Flush opens at the Neuberger Museum of Art". artdaily.com. Retrieved 2019-05-04.
  17. ^ Frank, Priscilla (2012-10-25). "Mashup Artist Creates Giant 60-Foot Painting". HuffPost. Retrieved 2019-05-03.
  18. ^ "Nina Chanel Abney - Always A Winner". The Bholdr. Retrieved 2019-05-03.
  19. ^ a b c d "EXHIBITIONS". Nina Chanel Abney Studio. Retrieved 2018-05-02.
  20. ^ "Nina Chanel Abney Crated An Inclusive Playground For Adults". www.intomore.com. Retrieved 2019-05-03.
  21. ^ Gallery, Mary Boone. "Mary Boone Gallery". Mary Boone Gallery. Retrieved 2019-05-03.
  22. ^ "See Nina Chanel Abney's Powerful New Paintings About Racial Conflict and Contradictions in America". artnet News. 2017-12-15. Retrieved 2019-05-03.
  23. ^ "Nina Chanel Abney: Hot to Trot. Not. | Contemporary And". www.contemporaryand.com (in German). Retrieved 2019-05-03.
  24. ^ "Nina Chanel Abney". www.whitney.org.



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