Tom McGlynn

Small Grey Test Pattern 2 (Abstract Painting)

2004

Tom McGlynn is an American abstract artist whose oeuvre explores interactive color and proportion in tension with their potential semiotic meaning. He is also an independent curator and a writer, contributing regularly to The Brooklyn Rail. Furthermore, the artist is the founding director of Beautiful Fields, an organization dedicated to socially-engaged curatorial projects. He is currently teaching at the Parsons New School of Design in New York City. He lives and works in the NYC area. Born in 1958, the artist became interested in drawing at an early age. His talent was encouraged within his family and he eventually enrolled Ramapo College in New Jersey, earning a BFA in printmaking in 1980. In 1996, the artist obtained his MFA in painting from Hunter College. As an undergraduate student in his twenties, he was influenced by both art and literature, especially by the works of the artist Robert Smithson and the poet William Carlos Williams who both lived a formative and meaningful part of their lives in NJ, where McGlynn grew up. The artist's paintings are included in several permanent institutional collections, including the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Whitney Museum, and MoMA in NY. The artist has exhibited widely and participated in numerous site-specific installations and group projects throughout the US. In December 2015, his amazing oeuvre was included in the show Seltsame Kinder at Maniere Noire in Berlin. His pieces have appeared on the cover of Artforum and his exhibitions have been reviewed in the New York Times. In the fall and winter of 2016, his latest paintings will be included in Reunion, a show at QuadArt Dornbirn, Dornbirn, Austria and The Orange Show at Kilroy Metal Ceiling space, in Brooklyn, NY.