Shuffled Pairs

SHUFFLED PAIRS, 2024
Ink on paper
Dimensions variable

I started making Shuffled Pairs in early December at a makeshift drawing table looking out at the Mendocino coast. I set up at the window to paint the landscape but found myself making loosely patterned ink paintings instead. I then tore them into 3x4” segments, eight from each painting. I liked how they looked combined in a big group, but not as much as I liked specific pairings.

I separated the hundreds of torn parts into pairs and sent them to friends and collaborators around the world. The collective work is unlikely to ever be reassembled. Nor can it be destroyed really, existing in so many fragments in various places. Eventually, just a few pairs will remain, on the side of an old refrigerator or in a shoebox in someone’s closet. A testament to whatever came to pass in 2024, and everything that happened after.

Documentary screening in San Rafael

Art is a reflection of the place from which it emerges. Tell Them We Were Here chronicles the work of eight Bay Area artists and how each extends the legacy of local activism. Embedded within their practices we see the most pressing issues of our time: prison reform, homelessness, racial equity, feminism, environmental justice, and income inequality. In an age of hypercapitalism, these artists represent an empowering alternative worldview that emphasizes creativity and community over capital.

The film follows the work of artists Sadie Barnette, Amy Franceschini (Futurefarmers), Jim Goldberg, Tucker Nichols, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Alicia McCarthy, Nigel Poor (Ear Hustle), and Michael Swaine.

Join us after the screening for a Q&A with the filmmaker Griff Williams, as well as featured artist Tucker Nichols and curator Natasha Boas.

 

Documentary screening at SFMOMA

 

Tell Them We Were Here

Thursday, Nov 10, 2022, 6 p.m.
Phyllis Wattis Theater, Floor 1

Reservations are at capacity. A rush ticketing line will form 30 minutes prior to the event with seating available on a first come, first served basis.

Art is a reflection of the place from which it emerges. Tell Them We Were Here chronicles the work of eight Bay Area artists and how each extends the legacy of local activism. Embedded within their practices we see the most pressing issues of our time: prison reform, homelessness, racial equity, feminism, environmental justice, and income inequality. In an age of hypercapitalism, these artists represent an empowering alternative worldview that emphasizes creativity and community over capital.

The film follows the work of artists Sadie Barnette, Amy Franceschini (Futurefarmers), Jim Goldberg, Tucker Nichols, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Alicia McCarthy, Nigel Poor (Ear Hustle), and Michael Swaine.

Join us after the screening for a Q&A with the filmmakers, Griff and Keelan Williams, as well as featured artists Sadie Barnette, Jim Goldberg, and Tucker Nichols.

 

Inside Track

This is what a vacation rental looks like after my brother and I have been there for a couple days:

https://vimeo.com/754428018

Inside Track, 2022
Jon and Tucker Nichols
Mendocino, CA

Stanford commission

Proud to be included in this remarkable permanent art installation at Stanford Hospital, including David Hockney, Jennifer Bartlett, Anish Kapoor, Ellsworth Kelly, Alicia McCarthy, Roy Lichtenstein, and many other great artists.

Tucker Nichols, 8 Flowers, 2022
Eight framed paintings on Masonite
Stanford Hospital Children’s Emergency Room, Palo Alto, CA

 

The Every

I made another cover for Dave Eggers’ great creepy novel, The Every

 

UNGUN PRINT

Tucker Nichols
UNGUN AMERICA, 2022
17 x 11", print edition of 100
Signed and numbered by the artist
Gallery 16 Editions
The first 50 will be priced at $75
Pre Order HERE

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GALLERY 16
San Francisco

The Highland Park mass shooting took the life of our friend Pete Strauss’ father, Stephen Strauss. It was another ceaseless reminder of just how close to home our nation’s gun violence problem is.

In response to this senseless murder, we asked Tucker Nichols to create a limited edition print. All proceeds will go to the Gabby Giffords Law Center To Prevent Gun Violence. 

The famous Flower Power photograph by Bernie Boston was taken during the March on the Pentagon October 21, 1967. Since that date more than 1.5 million Americans have died in gun-related incidents, according to data from the U.S. Centers For Disease Control and Prevention. By comparison, approximately 1.2 million service members have been killed in every war in U.S. history. Tucker draws from the motif in this iconic photo to create the image for this print. 

 

Bavaria

Tucker Nichols
Bavarian Watercolors, 2022

In Bavaria, the Alps are always there: sometimes looming, more often receding like rows of curtains. But no matter how big you can imagine the mountains to be, they are dwarfed by the summer sky.
— Tucker Nichols, Bavaria, Germany, July 2022

 

Never Better music

I invited some friends to create playlists in response to the exhibition NEVER BETTER at Gallery 16. The collected music has been playing in the gallery over the course of the show. Please enjoy.

 

Never Better Pt. 2

Due to the great response to Never Better—and productive studio time during the pandemic—we’ve decided to reinstall most of the gallery with a second iteration of the exhibition. I hope you’ll come have a look if you’re in the area.

Write to griff@gallery16.com for an updated checklist.

More images and information at Gallery 16, SF
Tucker Nichols: Never Better Part 2 is on view through March 25.
Open Tues - Fri: 10 - 5pm, Sat: 11 - 5pm

 

A seemingly urgent message from Daniel Handler

New paintings and sculptures at Gallery 16

From the desk of Daniel Handler:

Plenty of gallery exhibitions have been described as important or even crucial.  But this month marks the opening of an exhibit that is mandatory.  Everybody has to see it.  Gallery 16 will welcome people of all ages, genders, cultures, and heights for a required viewing of Tucker Nichols's new artwork.

"It is not optional," says artist and gallery founder Griff Williams, whose statements have not been verified for this press release.  "Everybody absolutely has to come here and see this stuff."

"Every artist can't help but have the idea of an audience influencing--some would say overshadowing--their creative process," says Nichols, who has had work featured at SF MOMA, the Contemporary Jewish Museum, and other optional venues.  "With a mandatory show, that weight is finally lifted.  Cowabunga!  Tell them I said absolutely anything--I'm giving you complete creative control for this press release.  Fruit salad is delicious."

"Art always asks enormous questions," says art expert and person I made up, Colleen Sandwich, who supported the exhibition's mandate by making a flag.  "What can truly be considered art?  Who should see it?  At last, we have definitive answers: Tucker Nichols's work, and everybody in the whole entire world."

"Frankly, I don't get how this could even happen," says a local small businessman and spoilsport.  "Gallery 16 is a dynamic but small gallery, and there are a ton of people.  I mean, does everybody in the whole world even know about this show?  I bet most people don't.  And what if they live far away?  Also, if they line up on the sidewalk, they block the entrance to my bike helmet shop, and how am I gonna sell bike helmets if that happens?"

But Williams and Nichols scoff at such complaints.  "We'll get some of those velvet ropes or whatever, you know what I mean, that they use outside nightclubs and stuff," Williams says.  "Everybody has to go!  No excuses!"

"Like, don't tell me you don't know about the show," Nichols said.  "It's literally listed online.  You have no excuse.  The show closes at the end of March.  I don't want to hear something like, but I'm supposed to go to a wedding.  Bring the bride!  This is mandatory."

The show is full of paintings that are super colorful and diverting to look at--flowers and boats, you know, with some more abstract stuff too.  Sculpture, also-assemblages you might call them, or just things next to other things, or on top of them, in a way that makes you think "huh??" but also, if you just wait for a second, beautiful and fun.  You can do a loop around one of the rooms looking at all of them, and then return to your favorites.  Things have been difficult lately--really difficult.  This is something else.  You don't even need to stare at them very long before your mind slips away from all of the horrendous crap of life.  Being afraid, being disgusted or hopeless, becomes something you don't have to do.  It's optional.  There's joy instead, right in front of you, joy somebody made, and now you're helping make it, real joy.  That's the thing.  Joy is mandatory.  

For more information, contact Griff at 4156267495 or griff@gallery16.com

Untitled (BR2218), 2022