Contemporary Project 16: Tammy Nguyen

Multidisciplinary artist Tammy Nguyen is known internationally for her paintings, prints, and unique artist books. She also publishes work through her own imprint, Passenger Pigeon Press. In her richly layered and captivating artworks, Nguyen brings together global histories, literary traditions, and evolving visual traditions. Her compositions are filled with figures, plants, animals, and enigmatic symbols, inviting viewers into a world where cultural and historical narratives come to life in complex and unexpected ways. 

For the sixteenth Contemporary Project in the museum’s series showcasing innovative work by contemporary artists, multidisciplinary artist Tammy Nguyen is creating brand-new work, including paintings, prints, and a handmade artist book. Drawing on literary references, Cold War–era science, and intricate ecological imagery, her richly layered compositions interweave figures, flora, fauna, and symbolic forms to explore how ambition, belief, and invention intersect, and how the drive to transcend human limits can slip into instability.

Alongside her own work, Nguyen is selecting objects from the Blanton’s collection to display in adjacent galleries. Spanning 18th-century engravings to mid-20th-century photography, these objects highlight connections across time and medium, revealing how artists have grappled with questions of power, progress, and the natural world in distinct yet resonant ways.

Organized by Hannah Klemm, Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, Blanton Museum of Art 

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About the Artist

Tammy Nguyen (b. 1984) was born and raised in San Francisco. She earned a B.F.A. from Cooper Union in 2007 and an M.F.A. from Yale University in 2013. In 2023, she was named a Guggenheim Fellow. Her other honors include the Herb Alpert Award in the Arts (California, 2024); the NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship in Painting (New York, 2021); and the Scholarship for Advanced Studies in Book Arts from the Center for Book Arts (New York, 2014). 

Nguyen has presented solo exhibitions at the Sarasota Art Museum (2024), the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston (2023), and the Brooklyn Public Library (2022), among others. Her work has been included in international biennials such as the 12th Berlin Biennale (2022); Greater New York 2021 at MoMA PS1; and Bronx Calling: The Third AIM Biennial at the Bronx Museum of the Arts (2015). She currently serves as a professor of art at Wesleyan University in Connecticut.