Nathan Hylden

Nathan Hylden (born 1978 in Fergus Falls, Minnesota) is a contemporary American abstract painter based in Los Angeles, California. He is known for creating abstract paintings exploring philosophical relationships between cause and effect, absence and presence, and emptiness and meaning; as well as for process-oriented artworks that investigate dualities of existence.

Painting style Hylden utilizes diverse media in his paintings, such as aluminum, pearlescent paint, spray paints, and even blank canvases. Hylden often questions the essence of painting in his artworks. For his 2010 series of nine paintings, Hylden devised a strict technical process of painting canvases with holographic gold, arranging them on the floor, spray painting the overlapping sections in yellow, and finally stenciling black stripes onto each piece. As such, he created unique but interconnected pieces.

Hylden likes to hint at the source of his abstract paintings. His studio is a source of his inspiration and he has incorporated images of simple objects or groupings of objects from his studio into his paintings. The art critic Alicia Eler described this as ability to re-contextualize the mundane in the context of art. 2019, Hakgojae Gallery, Seoul, South Korea 2018, For Now And So, Misako & Rosen, Tokyo, Japan 2018, So Doing, Galerie Art Concept, Paris, France 2017, Nearing On To Do, Midway Contemporary Art, Minneapolis, the United States 2015, Nathan Hylden, Johann Konig, Berlin, Germany 2014, Off All Things, Misako & Rosen, Tokyo, Japan 2014, More Over, Art: Concept, Paris, France 2013, Meanwhile, Kunstverein, Hamburg, Germany 2011, So There’s That, Richard Telles Fine Art, Los Angeles, US 2011, Volker Bradtke, Düsseldorf, Germany

Group exhibitions 2018, Did you close your eyes to make this painting?, BWSMX, Mexico City, Mexico 2015, Painting The Sky Blue Mallorca Landings, Palma de Mallorca, Spain 2010, Bagna Cauda, Galerie Art Concept, Paris, France