Tara Donovan

Prints

About

Tara Donovan builds large, labor-intensive, and site-specific installations out of everyday materials such as scotch tape, drinking straws, paper plates, roofing paper and Styrofoam cups. Donovan takes these materials and "grows" them through accumulation. The results are large-scale abstract floor and wall works suggestive of landscapes, clouds, cellular structures and even mold or fungus. In her words, "it is not like I'm trying to simulate nature. It's more of a mimicking of the way of nature, the way things actually grow."

When printing her etchings, Tara Donovan wanted to approximate the techniques she uses in her own studio to create her large scale unique pieces. Ferric chloride solution, an etching corrosive, was combined with liquid bubble soap. Tara used a straw to blow air into this mixture making different size bubbles that she carefully picked up with a plastic spoon and laid on the aquatinted plates. The bubbles were left on the plates until they popped or dissolved, allowing the ferric chloride to etch the surface of the plate.

When Tara completed the process of applying bubbles to each plate, the acid residue and rosin were cleaned off the plate and then printed. The variety of dark to light bubble images was achieved by controlling the saturation of liquid in each bubble. Each edition was made by printing each plate twice. First in a light blue and then printing slightly off register in black to create the illusion that the bubbles are floating off the paper.
— Pace Prints
  • Tara Donovan creates large-scale installations and sculptures made from everyday objects. Known for her commitment to process, she has earned acclaim for her ability to discover the inherent physical characteristics of an object and transform it into art. Donovan’s many accolades include the prestigious MacArthur Foundation “Genius” Award (2008); and first annual Calder Prize (2005), among others. For over a decade, numerous museums have mounted solo exhibitions of Donovan’s work including the Metropolitan Museum of Art (2007-2008), UCLA Hammer Museum (2004), and Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (1999-2000). Donovan’s work appears in numerous public collections including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; and The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

  • 1969 Born in New York; Currently lives and works in Brooklyn

    EDUCATION
    1987-1988
    Attends School of Visual Arts, New York

    1991
    Corcoran College of Art and Design, Washington, DC, BFA

    1999
    Virginia Commonwealth University, MFA
    The Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant

    2001
    The Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Grant

    2003
    Augustus Saint-Gaudens Memorial Sculpture Fellowship
    New York Foundation for the Arts Grant

    2004
    Women's Caucus for Art, Presidential Award
    National Academy Museum, Helen Foster Barnett Prize
    American Academy of Arts and Letters, Metcalf Award

    SOLO EXHIBITIONS
    2006
    New Work, Pace Wildenstein, New York, NY

    2004
    Akira Ikeda Gallery, Berlin
    Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, La Jolla, CA
    Project Room: Glass Cube, Ace Gallery, Beverly Hills
    Hammer Projects, Arm and Hammer Museum, UCLA, Los Angeles
    The Augustus Saint-Gaudens Memorial, Cornish, NH

    2003
    Museum of Contemporary Art, Cleveland
    Drawings, Shaheen Modern and Contemporary Art, Cleveland
    Rice University Gallery, Houston
    IBM Building, New York

    2001
    Colony, Ace Gallery, New York
    Ace Gallery, Los Angeles
    John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, WI

    2000
    Ace Gallery, Los Angeles

    1999
    Hemicycle Gallery, The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington

    1998
    New Sculpture, Reynolds Gallery, Richmond
    Resonances, Hemphill Fine Arts, Washington

    GROUP EXHIBITIONS
    2006
    Some Kind of Wonderful: Recent Sculpture by James O. Clark and Tara Donovan, Maier Museum of Art/Randolph Macon Women's College, Lynchburg, VA

    2005
    Distillation to Complication: 40 Years of Rule Based Art, Pace Wildenstein, New York
    Selected Saint-Gaudens Fellows, USB Paine Webber Gallery, New York
    Summer Group Show, Pace Wildenstein, New York, NY

    2004
    Drawings, Plane Space, New York
    179th Annual, National Academy Museum, New York
    Cleanliness, Sara Meltzer Gallery, New York
    Invitational Exhibition of Paintings and Sculpture, American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York

    2003
    Off the Beaten Track: Contemporary Landscapes, Mead Art Museum, Amherst College, MA
    Bits and Pieces, DUMBO Art Center, New York
    Under Pressure, Cooper Union, New York

    2002
    Art on Paper, Weatherspoon Art Gallery, University of North Carolina, Greesnboro
    Fictions in Wonderland, Reynolds Gallery, Richmond, VA
    Accumulation, Clifford Smith Gallery, Boston
    Print Matters: New Works and Modern Treasures, Virginia Museum of Art, Richmond

    2000
    Whitney Biennial, The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
    Summer'00 New Prints, David Adamson Gallery, Washington, DC

    1999
    Fresh Meat, Kim Foster Gallery, New York

    1997
    What's Hot, Baumgartner Galleries, Washington, DC

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