The Menil Collection The Menil Collection

Nancy Grossman and the Menil’s Senior Curator Michelle White discuss the artist’s practice of more than fifty years. Grossman’s provocative works—Gunhead, 1984, and Head, 1968—both on view in the museum’s galleries.

Nancy Grossman (b. 1940, New York) studied painting under Richard Lindner at Pratt Institute and earned her BFA in 1962. Her first solo exhibition was held at Krasner Gallery in 1964 and she was awarded a Guggenheim fellowship the following year. In the late 1960s, Grossman began creating her famous leather-covered head sculptures along with her related collages and drawings. She has received numerous accolades throughout her career including a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship (1984), a National Academician Award from the National Academy Museum (1994), a Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant (1996–97), a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant (2001), and a Women’s Caucus for Art Lifetime Achievement Award (2008). Grossman’s work has been the subject of two major solo museum exhibitions: Nancy Grossman: Heads at MoMA PS1 which surveyed the artist’s leather head sculptures in 2011, and Nancy Grossman: Tough Life Diary in 2012, a five-decade survey curated by Ian Berry for Tang Teaching Museum, which was accompanied by a published comprehensive monograph. Grossman’s work is represented in numerous museum collections worldwide. She is exclusively represented by Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC.

As always, Menil programs are free and open to all.

The Artist Talk series is supported by a gift from the Cockrell Family Fund.