Party, Nicolas | Untitled (portrait), 2014 — available on Composition Gallery

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Watercolour on paper. Hand-signed by artist, Signed verso.

On softly mottled dark green ground, Party paints a melancholy young figure: golden curl halo, faceted cream skin, soulful pale-blue eyes, pursed pink lips, a white scarf scattered with small fir trees under a deep red sweater. The watercolour is built in flat decorative planes; the dark backdrop holds the figure like an altarpiece. Watercolour on paper, hand-signed verso. Party's intimate portraits are among the most desirable contemporary works on paper, distilling Baroque composure into a contemporary vocabulary. A confident, quiet acquisition.

Nicolas Party (Switzerland, 1980) is a contemporary artist celebrated for his surreal, vividly colored landscapes and portraits. Working across painting, sculpture, and installation, he reimagines classical genres with a modern twist. Party’s art often features soft pastel as a primary medium, creating dreamlike atmospheres that captivate viewers.

Nicolas Party

Untitled (portrait), 2014

Name: Untitled (portrait), 2014
SKU: 17527

Form

Painting

PaintingPainting is the process of applying media to a surface, using a tool such as a brush. The term refers to both the action and the resulting object. Artists use many tools to paint, such as brushes, airbrushes, palette knives, sponges or fingers and hands.

Medium

Watercolor

WatercolorWatercolor refers to both the medium and the resulting artwork created using pigments suspended in a water-soluble vehicle. Watercolors are known for their luminous, transparent appearance because the pigments are applied in pure form with minimal fillers. By adding Chinese white, the watercolor can become opaque, resembling gouache.

Edition

Unique work

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●Inventory 17527

●Signed

Limited Edition Print

Mixed Media

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The contemporary painter, installation artist, and sculptor, Nicholas Party, is most well-known for the critically acclaimed way in which he unites a disquieting form of representation with otherwise soothing pastel colors and flowing, simplified organic shapes. Although his works characteristically feature sharp demarcations between the various subjects and elements of his compositions, they nevertheless reflect his early interest in graffiti art, exhibiting an air-brushed quality.

His landscapes feature highly stylized, abstracted depictions of trees, shrubs, and other flora, which are reminiscent of both Félix Vallotton's unemotional landscapes and Theodor Seuss Geisel's well-known illustrations.

With respect to his portraits, Nicholas Party's figures appear both imposing and yet supple, owing to his skilled use of shading. Although irrealist in form, his subjects often stare out from the canvass with wide, penetrating eyes, much in the manner of Ferdinand Hodler's realist portraits. By denuding his own subjects of the detail associated with realist representations and depicting them as androgenous, Party's subjects appear uncanny and intense—features which are exacerbated by his use of solid backgrounds and the unusual perspective imposed upon them.

Artwork by Jean-Michel Basquiat

What is Street art?

Street Art is artwork created and executed in public spaces, outside of traditional art venues. It gained popularity during the 1980s graffiti art boom and has since evolved into various forms and styles. Common forms of Street Art include pop-up art, sticker art, stencil graffiti, and street installations or sculptures. Terms like guerrilla art, neo-graffiti, post-graffiti, and urban art are often used interchangeably to describe this genre, which challenges conventional ideas about where and how art should be displayed.

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Nicolas Party

Untitled (portrait), 2014

18 x 13.5 cm

Language & Currency

Nicolas Party