Nicole Polonsky is a visual artist who seeks out latent meaning in found objects and texts and articulates her responses in thought-provoking ways. Nicole is especially drawn to subjects that have been overlooked, marginalised, erased or considered valueless. She strives to achieve finished pieces that are succinct and free from gratuitous expressivity. Despite their formal restraint, her multivalent works confront very human emotions and experiences – humour, regret, melancholy, nostalgia, loss and grief – explicitly, or through allusion or metaphor.
Nicole’s practice encompasses editioned prints, bookworks and multiples; drawing and unique object-making; film, installations and performance; writing for publication. She also devises and produces group projects and exhibitions, and collaborates with other practitioners to realise cross-disciplinary ventures.
Nicole gained her BA at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art, University of Oxford, and an MA Print at the Royal College of Art. Exhibitions include lapse:re:lapse, MOCA London UK (solo); The Book as Art, DeKalb County Public Library, Georgia USA; A Pollock’s Gallimaufry, Pollock’s Toy Museum, London UK (co-curator and participant); ACE-funded Lighting Up Time, Northern Print and Side Cinema, Newcastle UK (solo); The Contemporary Print, Flatbed Press and Gallery, Texas USA; Y not I, The House of St Barnabas, London UK (solo). Nicole’s work is held in private collections internationally and public collections at Museum of Modern Art, Decatur Arts Alliance, Lafayette College (USA); MACBA Museum of Contemporary Art of Barcelona (Catalonia/Spain); University of Oxford, Victoria and Albert Museum, Manchester Metropolitan University, Essex County Council, Chelsea College of Arts Library and the Poetry Library (UK). Her practice has been featured in a number of publications including Creative Review, Art Monthly and Printmaking Today, as well as Michael Petry’s The Word is Art (Thames & Hudson). Born in Switzerland, Nicole Polonsky now lives and works in the UK.
Nicole’s practice encompasses editioned prints, bookworks and multiples; drawing and unique object-making; film, installations and performance; writing for publication. She also devises and produces group projects and exhibitions, and collaborates with other practitioners to realise cross-disciplinary ventures.
Nicole gained her BA at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art, University of Oxford, and an MA Print at the Royal College of Art. Exhibitions include lapse:re:lapse, MOCA London UK (solo); The Book as Art, DeKalb County Public Library, Georgia USA; A Pollock’s Gallimaufry, Pollock’s Toy Museum, London UK (co-curator and participant); ACE-funded Lighting Up Time, Northern Print and Side Cinema, Newcastle UK (solo); The Contemporary Print, Flatbed Press and Gallery, Texas USA; Y not I, The House of St Barnabas, London UK (solo). Nicole’s work is held in private collections internationally and public collections at Museum of Modern Art, Decatur Arts Alliance, Lafayette College (USA); MACBA Museum of Contemporary Art of Barcelona (Catalonia/Spain); University of Oxford, Victoria and Albert Museum, Manchester Metropolitan University, Essex County Council, Chelsea College of Arts Library and the Poetry Library (UK). Her practice has been featured in a number of publications including Creative Review, Art Monthly and Printmaking Today, as well as Michael Petry’s The Word is Art (Thames & Hudson). Born in Switzerland, Nicole Polonsky now lives and works in the UK.