Overview

My practice is an exploration of confusion. I am interested in confusion as a tense space for either radical thinking or complacency. I explore what this tension means to me, and what it could mean to my viewers, by creating stories realized in printmaking, painting, publishing, and happenings.

 

— Tammy Nguyen

Tammy Nguyen is a multimedia artist whose work spans painting, drawing, printmaking and book making. Intersecting geopolitical realities with fiction, her practice addresses lesser-known histories through a blend of myth and visual narrative. She is the founder of Passenger Pigeon Press, an independent press that joins the work of scientists, journalists, creative writers, and artists to create politically nuanced and cross-disciplinary projects. 

 

Born in San Francisco, Nguyen received a BFA from Cooper Union in 2007. The year following, she received a Fulbright scholarship to study lacquer painting in Vietnam, where she remained and worked with a ceramics company for three years thereafter. Nguyen received an MFA from Yale in 2013 and was awarded the Van Lier Fellowship at Wave Hill in 2014 and a NYFA Fellowship in painting in 2021. She was included in Greater New York 2021 at MOMA PS1 and has also exhibited Smack Mellon, Rubin Museum, The Factory Contemporary Arts Centre in Vietnam, and the Bronx Museum, among others. Her work is included in the collections of Yale University, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, MIT Library, the Seattle Art Museum, the Walker Art Center Library, and the Museum of Modern Art Library, among others. She is an Assistant Professor of Art at Wesleyan University.

Biography

Born in San Francisco, CA in 1984

Lives and works in New York City

 

Education

 

2013

MFA, Painting and Printmaking, Yale University School of Art, New Haven, CT

2007

The Cooper Union School for the Advancement of Science and Art, New York, NY

 

Solo Exhibitions

 

2022

SEA Focus 2022, ‘Freehold,’ presented by Tropical Futures Institute, Singapore

2021

Smack Mellon, ‘Freehold’, Brooklyn, USA

 

Five Myles, ‘O, Two person exhibition with Thad Higa,’ curated by Marine Cournet, Brooklyn, USA

2020

Hesse Flatow, ‘Cave Matter’, New York, USA

 

Hunter Shaw Fine Art, ‘Facing New Axes, Two person exhibition with Adam deBoer’, Los Angeles, USA

 2019

Virginia Commonwealth University, ‘The Ship Named Atlast’, Richmond Virginia, USA

2018 CRUSH Curatorial, ‘One Blue Eye, Two Servings’, Two person exhibition with Nicole Won Hee Maloof, curated by Alison Karasyk, New York, USA
2017 The School of the Art Institute in Chicago, ‘How to Breathe in Selected Tropics, The Joan Flasch Artists’ Book Collection‘, Chicago, USA
 

Ground Floor Gallery, ‘Primate City’, curated by Dexter Wimberly, Brooklyn, USA

 

Château d’Ardelay, ‘Sortilège et diableries : l’inquiétant ordinaire’, Les Herbiers, France

Works
Press