Painter, b. 1957 -

George Condo is an American painter, sculptor and musician who helped to pioneer Neo-Expressionism in the 1980s, crafting a new genre of painting sometimes called Psychological Cubism, though Condo's own term for his style is Artificial Realism. His style is distinct from contemporaries, such as Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat, but the trio are often grouped together for their heavy influence on late-20th century American art.

About George Condo

• Name: George Condo


• Alias: George Condo


• Profession: Printmaker, sculptor, painter and sketch artist, b. 1957 -


• Nationality: American

Biography

George Condo was born in Concord, New Hampshire in 1957, and studied both art history and music theory at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. Early on, his artistic focus was on music, particularly the then-emerging Punk genre. Condo played bass for the band The Girls in 1979, and he helped to found the band, Hi Sheriffs of Blue, the following year.

After a chance encounter with Jean-Michel Basquiat in a club in 1979, Condo made the decision to move to New York and devote most of his time to visual art. Heavily influenced by the prior work of Cubists and Surrealists, such as Pablo Picasso and René Magritte, Condo's style developed into a distinctive blend of shifted perspectives and ordinary objects (often musical instruments) depicted in unconventional ways.

Condo's work has been tremendously successful. His paintings have been commissioned for cover art on collections of Kerouac's poems and several album covers, notably for Phish, Danny Elfman and Travis Scott, as well as for Kanye West, who commissioned multiple pieces for 2010's My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.

George Condo currently lives in New York's East Village.

Related Styles

• Surrealism


• Neo-Expressionism


• Pop Art


• Street Art


• Analytical Cubism


• Synthetic Cubism

Highlights and Achievements

• Condo received a 1999 Academy Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.


• He was the winner of the Francis J. Greenburger Award in 2005.


• He taught a six-month course at Harvard University called Painting Memory.

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