Sue Williams
(Born 1954)
Sue Williams was born in Chicago in 1954. She received her BFA in 1976 from the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia. Working predominantly with oil and acrylic on canvas, Williams came to prominence in the early 1980s, exploring themes of postmodern feminism and personal experience. Influenced by the aesthetic of Abstract Expressionism, Williams merges colorful abstraction with feminist sexual imagery, inspiring a dynamism and unconventional theatricality unique to her work. Williams challenges sexuality, gender, violence, and aggression through her signature cartoon-like swirls of abstraction.
Sue Williams has exhibited extensively throughout the United States and Europe. Her works have been shown in exhibitions in major institutions including the Whitney Museum of American Art, Museum of Modern Art, New York, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, MoMA P.S. 1, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, Institut Valencià d’Art Modern, Valencià, and Secession, Vienna. Williams lives and works in New York.
EDUCATION
1976 | BFA California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA
1973 | Cooper Union, New York
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2023
Sue Williams, Galerie Eva Presenhuber, Zurich, Switzerland
2022
Skarstedt, Paris
2020
Sue Williams, 303 Gallery, New York, NY
Sue Williams, Galerie Eva Presenhuber, Zurich, Switzerland
2018
Sue Williams: New Paintings, Skarstedt, London
Sue Williams: Paintings 1997-98, Skarstedt, New York
Regen Projects, Los Angeles, CA
2017
303 Gallery, New York
2016
Galerie Eva Presenhuber, Zurich, Switzerland
2014
303 Gallery, New York
James Cohen, Shanghai, China
2013
Maruani & Noirhomme, Brussels, Belgium
2011
Regen Projects, Los Angeles, CA
2010
Al-Qaeda is the CIA, 303 Gallery, New York
Galerie Eva Presenbuber, Zurich, Switzerland
2008
Sue Williams: Project for the New American Century, David Zwirner, New York, NY *
Ormeau Baths Gallery OBG, Belfast, Ireland
2006
Regen Projects, Los Angeles
Galerie Eva Presenhuber, Zurich, Switzerland
Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea, Wales
Oriel Mostyn Gallery, Liandudno, Wales
2005
303 Gallery, New York
2004
Bernier / Eliades Gallery, Athens, Greece
Kukje Gallery, Seoul, Korea
Addison Gallery of American Art, Andover, MA
2003
Regen Projects, Los Angeles
Carpenter Center, Harvard, Cambridge, MA
Galeria Il Capricorno, Venice
Institut Valencia d’Art Modern, Valencia, Spain
Secession, Vienna, Austria; IVAM, Valencia, Spain
Galerie Hauser, Wirth & Presenhuber, Zurich, Switzerland
303 Gallery, New York
Palm Beach Institute of Contemporary Art, Palm Beach, FL
Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden, Germany
2001
Gallery Side 2, Tokyo
Bernier/Eliades, Athens, Greece
2000
303 Gallery, New York
Galeria Il Capricorno, Venice, Italy
Galeria Joan Prats, Barcelona, Spain
1999
Hauser, Wirth & Presenhuber, Zurich, Switzerland
1998
303 Gallery, New York
Neue Galerie und Landesmuseum Joanneum, Graz, Austria
Galerie Jean Bernier, Athens, Greece
Sadie Coles, London
Galeria Il Capricorno, Venice
Künstlerhaus, Graz, Austria
1997
Centre d'Art Contemporain, Geneva, Switzerland
Galleria Il Capricorno, Venice
Johnen & Schottle, Cologne, Germany
1996
303 Gallery, New York
Galerie Ghislaine Hussenot, Paris
Jean Bernier Gallery, Athens, Greece
Regen Projects, Los Angeles
Modulo Gallery, Lisbon, Portugal
1995
Jack Hanley Gallery, San Francisco
Galerie Metropol, Vienna, Austria
1994
303 Gallery, New York
Galleria Il Capricorno, Venice
Modulo, Lisbon, Portugal
Galerie Walcheturm, Zurich, Switzerland
1993
Vera Vitagioia, Naples, Italy
San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco
Galerie Rizzo, Paris
Editions Julie Sylvester, New York
1992
303 Gallery, New York
Stuart Regen Gallery, Los Angeles
Gallery 210, University of Missouri, St Louis, MO
1991
Amy Lipton Gallery, New York
1989
Loughelton Gallery, New York
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2023
Radical Abstraction, Skarstedt, London
2019
Inaugural Exhibition, Skarstedt 64th Street, New York
303 Gallery: 35 Years, 303 Gallery, New York
Downtown Painting, Presented by Alex Katz, Peter Freeman, Inc., New York
2018
Lineage: de Kooning and His Influence, Skarstedt, New York
Everything is Connected: Art and Conspiracy, The Met Breuer, New York
Chaos and Awe: Painting for the 21st Century, Frist Center for the Visual Arts, Nashville, TN
Trance, Aïshti Foundation, Lebanon
Remote Castration, Laxart, Los Angeles, CA
2017
Animal Farm, The Brant Foundation Art Study Center, Greenwich, CT
Larry Clark, White Trash, Luhring Augustine, New York
Zeitgeist, MAMCO, Geneva, Switzerland
Attics of My Life, Jack Hanley Gallery, New York
What I Loved: Selected Works from the 90s, Regen Projects, Los Angeles
The American Line, Skarstedt, New York
2016
Man Alive, Maruani Mercier Gallery, Brussels, Belgium
Seeing double: artist duos in the Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy, London
New York New York, Paint! Paint!, Showroom, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Don’t Look Back: The 1990s, Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles, Los Angeles
2015
Painting 2.0 Expression in the information age, Museum Brandhorst, Munich, Germany
Greater New York, MoMA PS1, New York
Better Than de Kooning, Villa Merkel, Esslingen, Germany
America is Hard to See, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
No Man’s Land: Women Artists from the Rubell Family Collection, Rubell Family Collection, Miami
2014
Take It or Leave It: Institution, Image, Ideology, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
2013
Comic Future, Ballroom Marfa, TX
2012
The Perfect Show, 303 Gallery, New York
Figuring Color, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA
The Displaced Person, Invisible-Exports, New York
2010
Keeping it Real: An Exhibition in Four Acts: The D. Daskalopoulos Collection, Whitechapel Gallery, London
Visceral Bodies, Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, Canada
Collecting Biennials, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
2009
MOCA's First Thirty Years, MOCA Grand Avenue, Los Angeles
Rebelle: Art and Feminism 1969 - 2009, Museum voor Moderne Kunst Arnhem, Arnhem, Netherlands
2008
The Gallery, David Zwirner, New York
Pretty Ugly, Gavin Brown Enterprise and Maccarone, New York
Who’s Afraid of Jasper Johns?, Tony Shafrazi Gallery, New York
We Are Stardust, We Are Golden. Women at Johnen + Schöttle since 1984, Johnen + Schöttle, Cologne, Germany
Blasted Allegories - Werke aus der Sammlung Ringier, Kunstmuseum Luzern, Luzern, Switzerland
2007
Jubilee Exhibition, House Eva Presenhuber Vnà, Engiadina Bassa, Switzerland
The Third Mind, Palais de Tokyo, Paris
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, Museo de Bellas Artes Bilbao, Bilbao, Spain
JACKSON, Contemporary Art Galleries, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT
Beneath the Underdog, Gagosian Gallery, New York
Fast Forward: Collections for the Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TX
InWords: The Art of Language, University Gallery, University of Delaware, Newark, DE
Comic Abstraction: Image Breaking, Image Making, Museum of Modern Art, New York
2006
Open House, Ellipse Foundation, Lisbon, Portugal
Defamation of Character, P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City, NY
Into Me/Out of Me, P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City, NY: traveling to Kunst-Werke Berlin e.V. – Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin, Germany
Bearings: the Female Figure, PS 122 Gallery, New York
Lara Schnitger, Lily van der Stokker, Sue Williams, Modern Art, London
New York, New York: Fifty Years of Art, Architecture, Film, Music, and Video, Grimaldi Forum, Monaco
Still Points of the Turning World: SITE Santa Fe’s Sixth International Biennial, SITE Santa Fe, Santa Fe, NM
2005
Artists’ Books Revisited, Art Metropole, Toronto, Ontario, Canada: traveling to Printed Matter, Inc., New York
Extreme Abstraction, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY, Interstate, Nicole Klagsbrun, New York
2004
North Fork / South Fork: East End Art Now, curated by Klaus Kertess, The Parrish Art Museum, South Hampton, NY
The American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York
2003
Size Matters, Texas Gallery, Houston, TX
Drawing, G Gallery, Washington, DC
Social Strategies: Redefining Social Realism, University of Santa Barbara, CA
2002
Comic Release: Negotiating Identity for a New Generation, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA
Contemporary Art Project, Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA
Art in the ‘toon age, Kresge Art Museum, Michigan State University, MI
Brooklyn!, Palm Beach Institute of Contemporary Art, Lake Worth, FL
Works on Paper From Acconci to Zittel, Victoria Miro Gallery, London
Collaboration With Parkett: 1984 to NOW, Museum of Modern Art, New York
Pop & Post-Pop [On Paper], Texas Gallery, Houston, TX
Locating Drawing, Lawing Gallery, Houston, TX
2000
Open Ends, Museum of Modern Art, New York
Drawings 2000, Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York
There Is Something You Should Know: EVN Sammlung, Sammlung, Austria
Galerie Belvedere, Vienna, Austria
Palais De Beaux-Art de Bruxelles, curated by Thierry de Dove, Brussels, Belgium
1999
The American Century: Art & Culture 1900-2000, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
Negotiating Small Truths, The Jack S. Blanton Museum of Art, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX
1998
Kunsthalle Krems, Krems, Austria
Skulptur Figur Weiblich, Landesgalerie Oberosterreich, Linz, Austria
Painting: Now and Forever, Part I, Pat Hearn and Matthew Marks Gallery, New York
Pop Surrealism, The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT
Connections, Contradictions, Emory University, Atlanta, GA
1997
1997 Biennial Exhibition, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
Multiple Identity: Works from the Whitney Museum of American Art, Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona, Spain
Birth of the Cool, curated by Bice Curiger, Deichtorhallen, Hamburg, Germany, and Kunsthaus Zurich, Switzerland
Painting Project, Basilico Fine Arts and Lehmann Maupin, New York
1996
Ideal Standard Life, Spiral Wacoal Art Center, Tokyo
The Comic Depiction of Sex in American Art, Galerie Andreas Binder, Munich, Germany
1995
1995 Biennal Exhibition, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
25 Americans: Painting in the 90's, curated by Dean Sobel, Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI
Imperfect, Herter Art Gallery, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA
Oltre La Normalita Concentrica, curated by Gianni Romano, Comunune di Padova, Padova, Italy
feminimasculin, le sexe de l'art, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris
1994
Miriam Cahn, Marlene Dumas, Kiki Smith, Sue Williams, Centre d'Art Contemporain, Geneva, Switzerland
Coicido y Crucido, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid, Spain
1993
Sue Williams, Lorna Simpson, Tony Oursler, John Currin, Kathe Burkhart, Galleria Galliani, Genova, Italy
Sue Williams/Wendy Jacobs, Galerie Walcheturm, Zurich, Switzerland
1993 Biennial Exhibition, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
Regarding Masculinity, Arthur Roger Gallery, New Orleans, LA
Bad Girls, Institute of Contemporary Art, London, England and Center for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow, Scotland
1992
The Art of Language, Kunsthalle, Vienna, Austria; Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt, Germany
The Subject of Rape, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
Aperto, Venice Biennale, Venice
Die Arena Des Privaten, Kunstverein Munchen, Munchen, Germany
Privacy, curated by Gianni Romano, Documentario, Milan, Italy
Speilholle, curated by Kasper Konig and Robert Fleck, Akadamie der Kunste und Wissenschaften, Frankfurt, Germany
Getting to kNOw you, Kunstlerhaus, Bethanien, Berlin, Germany
Drawings, Jack Hanley Gallery, San Francisco
Fear of Painting, curated by Dan Cameron, Arthur Roger Gallery, New York
Darkness Visible, The Drawing Center, New York
How It Is, curated by Jonathan Seliger, Tony Shafrazi Gallery, New York
Dysfunction in the Family Album, curated by David Humphrey, Diane Brown Gallery, New York
1991
Ashley King, Lauren Szold, Sue Williams, 303 Gallery, New York
Drawings, Charles Cowles Gallery, New York
New Generations: New York, curated by Elaine King, Carnegie Mellon Art Gallery, Pittsburgh, PA
Presenting Rearwards, curated by Ralph Rugoff, Rosamund Felsen Gallery, Los Angeles
1990
Karen Kilimnik, Gavin Brown, Sue Williams, 303 Gallery, New York
Brut 900, White Columns, New York
1989
Hard Life, White Columns, New York
1988
Gallery Artists, Loughelton Gallery, New York
1987
Lust, M-13 Gallery, New York
The Double Bind, Loughelton Gallery, New York, NY, in collaboration with "Art Against AIDS" *
1985
Sex Show, Cable Gallery, New York
1984
Chill Out New York, Kenkeleba House, New York
Group Show, Hudson Center, New York
1983
Sue Williams, Vincent Gallo, curated by Edit Deak, Patrick Fox Gallery, New York
1980
Americans, Grand Palais, Paris
Interiors, Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York
PERFORMANCES
1986
Damaged Goods, The New Museum, New York, NY, "Docent Tour", with Andrea Fraser