Nina Bovasso

Kaleidoscope (Vortex Painting)

2008

Nina Bovasso was Born and raised in NYC, NY, where she currently lives & works. Her work is held in many museum permanent collections in the United States, and other public & private collections in the US and abroad. Ms. Bovasso attended NYC Public School and was raised by a single working mom who worked as a textile designer. Living in the Murray Hill neighborhood of NYC, close by her grandmother who taught her to sew and design clothes. Both of Ms. Bovasso's parents were painters, who met while students at The Cooper Union School of Art in NYC. Ms. Bovasso received her BFA from the San Francisco Art Institute, attended the Skowhegan School of Art in Maine, & completed a MFA in Painting from Bard College. Predominantly a maker of works on paper, " I was influenced by her mother who was a textile designer, creating designs with gouache on paper. My attempt at making designs whilst a student at SFAI, played a huge role in defining my own voice as an artist. Using gouache on paper to make these designs, one day breaking free of the limitations prescribed for design making, I started doing my own thing. This “breaking free” I feel, also plays a role in the content of my work, when I speak of anti-design or pattern gone amok.” Bovasso's work has been exhibited internationally, solo exhibitions include Josee Bienvenu Gallery in NYC, Sala Uno in Rome, Cleveland MOCA, Ohio, University Museum at SUNY Albany, New York; Galerie Schmela, Dusseldorf, Galerie Diana Stigter, Amsterdam, and Clementine Gallery, New York, NY. Group exhibitions include Out of Site, NewMuseum of Contemporary Art, NYC and Painters and Poets, Ulrich Museum, Wichita, KS. She is the recipient of several awards and grants, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, Louis Comfort Tiffany Artist Grant, New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship, and twice recipient from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation. In 2012 she was awarded a MacDowell Colony Fellowship. Her work has been reviewed and collected widely in the US and abroad. Bovasso held temporary academic appointments at the University of Georgia, California College of Art, University of Virginia, and University of Tennessee, and presented lectures about her work at numerous universities, including Princeton University, Northwestern University and the Cornell.