Born in Lausanne in , Party is a figurative painter who has achieved critical admiration for his familiar yet unsettling landscapes, portraits, and still lifes that simultaneously celebrate and challenge conventions of representational painting. His works are primarily created in soft pastel, an idiosyncratic choice of medium in the 21st-century, and one that allows for exceptional degrees of intensity and fluidity in his depictions of objects both natural and manmade.
Transforming these objects into abstracted, biomorphic shapes, Party suggests deeper connections and meanings. His unique visual language has coalesced in a universe of fantastical characters and motifs where perspective is heightened and skewed to uncanny effect.
In addition to paintings, Party creates public murals, pietra dura, ceramics, installation works, and sculptures, including painted busts and body parts that allude to the famous fragments of ancient Greece and Rome. He routinely deploys color and makes architectural interventions in exhibition spaces in order to construct enveloping experiences for the viewer.
One can also find within his works a 21st-century synthesis of the sorts of impulses and ideas that fueled the Renaissance and late 19th-century, early 20th-century figurative painting, the compositional strategies of Rosalba Carriera and Rachel Ruysch, and the visions of such self-taught artists as Louis Eilshemius and Milton Avery.
Nicolas Party, Portrait with Deer, Courtesy the artist Nicolas Party. Photo: Axel Dupeux. Selected Artworks. Face with Flower Red Portrait Landscape Head Load more. Sunrise Portrait with Flowers Still Life Portrait with a cat Portrait of Nicolas Party. Biography Print. Solo Exhibitions. Group Exhibitions. Exhibitions Gallery Exhibitions. Museum Exhibitions. Viewing Rooms. Films See more on Youtube. View all. Sat 15 February Los Angeles. Sat 7 October New York, 22nd Street.
