Jan Nelson

Nelson was born in Melbourne in 1955[1] and attended the Victorian College of the Arts, graduating in 1983.[4]

In 2018 she completed a PhD at Deakin University, Faculty of Arts & Education, School of Communication and Creative Arts, Melbourne. Her thesis, titled Lasagna composting: strategies for painting in a digital age proposed strategies for the survival of painting in a digital age. [5]

As a painter, Nelson originally explored landscape and in the 1980s focused on politics of occupations and space. Nelson produced drawings in crayon.[6] After the mid-1980s, Nelson focused on ideas about woman's place in society, and the invisibility of women in society. Her works incorporated traditional crafts including plaster work and basket weaving.[7]

In 1989-91 Nelson produced a series of works called The Long Century.[8]

In the 1990s, Nelson's works looked internationally at events beyond her native country, In her work International Behaviour (2000) she imposed a photograph of Vietnam refuges in boats on a background of vivid, psychedelic colours and patterns.[6] In 1994, Nelson exhibited sculptures recalling the grand canyon and the Amazon jungle: simple shapes on plinths. Even then critics noted her theatricality and comment on the traditional presenting of works on plinths.[9]

Nelson's more recent works are hyper realistic, and recall the gloss of advertising and magazine. Her works portray people between their worlds and their desires, often adolescents.[10]

Nelson's best known series is Walking in Tall Grass, portraits of adolescents, that Nelson worked on for fifteen years, ending in 2016. Nelson began with photographing people she knew as well as strangers. She drew on the photographs for the paintings, which may combine a head, a torso and features from multiple subjects she has photographed. When she paints the portraits, Nelson adds vibrant colours and often paints reflections in eyes or sunglasses. To heighten vibrancy, Nelson has painted exhibition walls in vibrant colours.[1] Each young adolescent is dressed and accessorized to express individuality as well as fashion at the time the painting was done.[11] Yet each individual looks away from the viewer, suggesting they are looking inward uncertain of where they are going.[12] In an interview, Nelson noted that when walking in tall grass you can't go back, you have to go forward, but you can't see where you are going.[12]

• 1983–1984 Australian Council for the Arts grant awarded to support Ms Nelson’s residency at the Owen Tooth Cottage, Vence, France[13]
• 1984–1985 Australian Council for the Arts Project Grant awarded[14]

• 1986 Artist in Residence, Victorian College of the Arts
• 2003–2004 Australia Council grant awarded[15]
• 2004 John McCaughey Memorial Art Prize at National Gallery of Victoria[16]
• 2009 Arthur Guy Art Prize, Bendigo Art Gallery[17]

• Art Gallery of New South Wales [18]
• Bendigo Art Gallery [19]
• Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney [1]
• National Gallery of Victoria [20]
• National Gallery of Australia [21]
• Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art [22]

• Official website