George Condo - American (b. 1957)

The New-Hampshire born painter, sculptor, printmaker, illustrator, and designer is modern syncretism incarnate. Having received formal academic training in art history and music theory at the University of Massachusetts, he became variously involved in the rock and punk scene in the late 1970s, and met fellow artist Jean-Michel Basquiat, who convinced him to relocate to the Big Apple. In this most American of metropolises, Condo spent nine months working as a diamond duster for Andy Warhol, indeed the only artist he has ever worked for. Emerging as a budding talent in the East Village art scene in the early 1980s, Condo developed his unique approach to painting, one that merges influences from Cubism, Surrealism, and other 20th century avant garde movements with American pop and cartoon, culminating in what he christened “Artificial Realism” or, in his own words, “the realistic representation of that which is artificial”. Condo’s career blurs the line between fine art and practical design, drawing and painting, as well as figuration and abstraction, as he primarily uses pastel, pencil, charcoal, and acrylic paint on canvas, typically in improvisation. He has over the years been commissioned to create numerous artworks for books and music albums alike.