Annina Nosei

Annina Nosei (born 1939) is an Italian-born art dealer and gallerist. Nosei is best known for being Jean-Michel Basquiat’s first art dealer and providing him with studio space in the basement of her gallery. From 1981 to 2006, the Annina Nosei Gallery represented or exhibited work by artists such as Barbara Kruger, Robert Longo, Ghada Amer, and Shirin Neshat.

Early life and education Annina Nosei was born in Rome, Italy, the daughter of a classics professor. She received doctorates in literature and philosophy from the University of Rome.

Career After graduating in the early 1960s, Nosei worked at Ileana Sonnabend' s Paris gallery. In 1964, Nosei received a Fulbright Program grant and moved to the United States, where she taught at the University of Michigan.

While teaching at UCLA in 1965, Nosei met art dealer John Weber through artist Robert Rauschenberg. She showed work by David Salle, Donald Newman, and Richard Prince. She invited Basquiat to participate in her Public Address group show later that year and provided him with studio space in the basement of her gallery. Nosei gave Basquiat his first American one-man show in March 1982. Nosei and Basquiat had conflicts about the transactions of his paintings, so he left her gallery by the summer of 1982 and Bruno Bischofberger became his art dealer.

In 1995, Nosei moved the gallery to 530 West 22nd Street in Chelsea, where she gave Shirin Neshat a solo exhibit that September. The Annina Nosei Gallery closed in 2006.

Nosei was a member of the authentication committee for the estate of Jean-Michel Basquiat, which ceased operation in 2012.

Legacy Nosei donated most of the gallery’s archive to the Fales Library and Special Collections at New York University (NYU). In 2024, she donated the gallery’s catalogues to Magazzino Italian Art’s Germano Celant Research Center in Cold Spring, New York.