Nicolas Party was born in 1980 in Lausanne, Switzerland, and lives and works in Brussels and New York. He studied at the ECAL in Lausanne and the Glasgow School of Art, where he completed his Masters in 2009. Painting on different surfaces (canvas, volumes of wood, or stone), he also executes large wall frescos that make visual reference to art history, advertising and the decorative arts in equal measure. He is influenced just as much by graffiti as by Giorgio Morandi, Félix Vallotton and Ferdinand Hodler. Party’s work incorporates familiar motifs and subjects: arrangements of fruit, pastoral scenes, portraits and quotidian objects. With its clear forms, vibrant colours and precise compositions, his instantly accessible and appealing painting reflects on the medium itself and interrogates the divide between representation and abstraction. His mural painting captivates the visitor with its emphatic stylisation and its facticity, which directs us towards a nature that is more artificial than ever and a living world that is becoming alien. The ornamental aspect is heightened as the flowers obey a foreign rule governing the decoration of a room.

Previous exhibitions (selection)

2016
Three Cats, The Modern Institute, Glasgow (United Kingdom)
Hammer Projects: Nicolas Party, The Hammer Museum, Los Angeles (United States)

2015
Pastel et Nu, Centre culturel suisse, Paris (France)

2012
Still Life, Stones and Elephants, Swiss Institute, New York (United States)