George Condo (b. 1957) studied Art History and Music Theory at the University of Massachusetts in Lowell. He has occupied a prominent position in the art world for close to three decades. Mr. Condo’s art can be viewed as a multi-layered experience incorporating art historical references ranging from European classicism to American contemporary culture, often combining elements of each to achieve a unique vision informed by all its sources. In his New Yorker profile on the artist, Calvin Tomkins observed that “instead of borrowing images or styles, [Condo] used the language of his predecessors, their methods and techniques, and applied them to subjects they would never have painted.” Speaking of Condo’s influence on the generations that have followed him, Laura Hoptman, curator in the Department of Painting and sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art stated, “George opened the door for artists to use the history of painting in a way that was not appropriation.”
His work is in the permanent collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, The Judith Rothschild Foundation, Philadelphia, The Broad Art Foundation, Santa Monica,Tate Gallery, London, Fonds National d’Art Contemporain, Ministère de la Culture, Paris, Fonds Regional d’Art Contemporain, Ile de France, Paris, Dakis Joannou Collection Foundation, Athens, Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Olso, Museu d’Art Contemporani, Barcelona, and the Doron Sebbag Art Collection, ORS Ltd., Tel Aviv.
Mr. Condo has been invited to lecture at many prestigious institutions including Columbia University, Yale University, Pasadena Art Center, San Francisco MOMA, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Mr. Condo taught a six-month course at Harvard University entitled Painting Memory.
In 1999 Mr. Condo received an Academy Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters; in 2005 he received the Francis J. Greenberger Award; and in 2013 Condo was honored by the New York Studio School. Most recently, in 2011, the New Museum, New York presented the retrospective exhibition, Mental States. This exhibition travelled to Museum Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam; Hayward Gallery, London; and Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt.
Currently, the Phillips Collection in Washington D.C. is planning his drawings retrospective for 2017, and next year, Mr. Condo’s work will be the feature of an exhibition at the Bergguen Museum, Berlin.
