Nicolas Party: Still Life, Stones and Elephants

Hailed as painter, illustrator, and graffiti artist, the praxis of Swiss artist Nicolas Party (b. 1980, lives in Glasgow, Scotland) is an earnest investigation into painting techniques and art historical sources. Party’s intervention at Swiss Institute brings together wall drawing, sculpture, and painting. The artist has created a brightly-colored, hand-painted pattern extending from Swiss Institute’s lobby to its office and stairwells. The decorative treatment establishes an expansive visual field, interrupted and punctuated by three large-scale, still-life charcoal wall drawings. Combining limitless pattern and traditional motifs, Party re-negotiates the divisions made between public and private space.