Almost Everything Else, Vol. 1
Tucker Nichols
presented by ZieherSmith
Almost Everything Else is a two-part exhibition of dynamic new paintings, drawings and sculptures by Tucker Nichols, with Vol. 2 to be held at another venue programmed by ZieherSmith. The work marks an even deeper, if less practical, continuation of the ideas from his current exhibition at the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum in Ridgefield, CT, here expanded to include works which can be read as vague and abstracted visual information. The range of subjects is broad and oddly specific at the same time: maps, electronics, astronomical data, the human body, cloud dynamics and even his trademark flowers are all suggested, sometimes in combination. This recent work is more complex and layered than previous exhibitions, marking the artist’s interest less in simplification of seemingly complex phenomena, and more in the depiction of complexity itself. By pointing our attention at languages of information that are just out of reach of our comprehension, we are brought to a place of unexpected bewilderment and delight. Nichols draws us into something beautiful only to leave us with a sense of futility. These artworks can neither be dismissed nor digested easily. Taken as a group, these three venues in the New York area mark a moment in Nichols’s career in which he celebrates the sheer energy of human curiosity and analysis for the sake of something beyond its technological, scientific, or even philosophical achievements. Nichols is reveling in the very idea of inquiry, stripped of any conclusions or applications. We are left with the pursuit itself, something as natural and powerful as any great breakthrough.
About the Artist
Tucker Nichols (b. 1970, Boston, MA) received his BA from Brown University and his MA from Yale University. His work has been included in exhibitions nationally and internationally, at venues including the Institute of Contemporary Art, Portland, ME; Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco; Contemporary Art Museum, Raleigh, NC; Asian Art Museum, San Francisco; Denver Art Museum, Denver; and SFMOMA, San Francisco, among others. He is represented by ZieherSmith in New York and Gallery 16 in San Francisco. He lives in Northern California.
About ZieherSmith
ZieherSmith is a contemporary art gallery in New York City first established on West 25th Street in 2003 by Andrea Smith Zieher and Scott Zieher. In 2009, the gallery moved and expanded on West 20th Street, where the program developed to include celebrated artists, while continuing to debut emerging artists. The gallery has also presented unique shows of historical material such as 2011’s Sculpture in So Many Words: Text Pieces, 1965-75, which traveled to the Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, in 2012-13, and a trio of critically acclaimed vernacular photography exhibitions: Photo Brut (2013), Other Bodies (2012), and Band of Bikers (2010). ZieherSmith was among the earliest members of the New Art Dealers Alliance (NADA) in 2003, and Andrea Zieher served as NADA’s President from 2006-2010. ZieherSmith has also forged ties in Nashville, Tennessee, where it has produced several art events and pop-up exhibitions since 2011.
