From Erin Cluley Gallery:

"Gaining prominence in the early 1980s, Nic Nicosia has garnered international acclaim for his staged photography. A relentless experimenter, Nicosia spent the last four decades diversifying his practice into film, sculpture, and collage. “I’ve never been completely comfortable being identified as a photographer” said Nic Nicosia, “My formal training and degree were in television and film; therefore, my approach to making art – as in motion pictures – is to use whatever material and medium necessary to realize the concept and story. This could require a sculptural work, collage, or drawing– as well as a camera.” Across media, his work displays a steadfast interest in narrative. Nicosia works with the eye of a skilled auteur and cinematographer, capturing the overlooked intricacies of everyday scenes and objects.

Erin Cluley Gallery presents the premiere of the latest installment in Nicosia’s homemade stories series. Against the background of his robust mid-century home, homemade stories: flowers, explores the fragile lifecycles of his floral characters. Nicosia uses his newest subjects to symbolize the natural inconsistencies of time spent during pandemic isolation. Blooming magnolias, orchids and tulips bring out the brilliance of the otherwise neutral palette in his home furnishings; Nicosia’s selective use of bright color conjures those brief moments of beauty and inspiration we experience among our everyday mundanities.

homemade stories: flowers will include Nicosia’s newest photocollages, referencing his style seen in his work pre -1979 while featuring fresh subjects and bringing the narrative full circle. In addition, the exhibition will feature sculptural objects and drawings relating to the photoworks. Through them, Nicosia maintains his characteristic deadpan surrealist style and draws inspiration from Dadaist collage, cinematic composition, and homemade crafts. 

 

About the Artist Nic Nicosia was born in 1951 in Dallas, TX. He received a BS in 1974 in Radio-TV-Film from The University of North Texas with a concentration in motion pictures. He subsequently applied his cinematic mind-set for the making of a still image and is recognized as a pioneer of the staged photographic movement that came into prominence in the early1980’s.

Following a 1982 solo exhibition at Artists Space in New York, he was included in the 1983 Whitney Biennial, and the Guggenheim’s 1983 Exxon National Exhibition. He has been included in several biennials including Documenta IX in 1992, and a second Whitney Biennial in 2000. In 1999 the Contemporary Arts Museum, in Houston, launched a 20-year retrospective of Nicosia's work; Nic Nicosia, Real Pictures 1979-1999. A 2nd major survey of his work was exhibited at CASA in Salamanca, Spain, in 2003. 

Museums that have acquired Nicosia’s work include: The Guggenheim Museum, The Museum of Modern Art, The Whitney Museum, The Los Angeles County Museum, The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, The Dallas Museum of Art, and The Houston Museum of Fine Arts. Grants and awards include a 2010 Guggenheim Fellowship, a Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation grant in 1984, Awards in the Visual Arts -AVA 11 in 1991, and The Tesuque Foundation, Artist Fellowship Grant in 1998.

The University of Texas Press produced a major career retrospective, Nic Nicosia, released in October of 2012. The book includes over 160 images and film stills from 1980 through 2011.

Erin Cluley Gallery is a contemporary art gallery representing emerging, mid-career, and established artists from Dallas and the United States. The gallery presents a provocative program of artists working in both traditional and alternative forms including painting, sculpture, new media, photography, sculptural installation and public intervention.  

In 2014, Erin Cluley Gallery ignited a creative movement in West Dallas acting as a hub for visual arts and community engagement. After nearly five years on Fabrication Street, the gallery has moved its operation to Riverbend – a development in Dallas’ Design District celebrating the intersection between culture and commerce.

 

In April 2021, Cluley opened Cluley Projects – a satellite location in West Dallas acting as an incubator space focusing on regional artists and providing a platform for discovery and mentorship."