William Nelson

I was born in Appleton, Wisconsin and raised in Orlando, Florida. I moved to New York City in 1985 where I started my career, got my MFA and raised a family. I have lived in Connecticut since 2005.

I define myself as a figurative painter and I also make life size kinetic figurative sculptures. The inspiration for my work dates back to a show I attended at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Manet and Velazquez, The French Taste For Spanish Painting. Velazquez's portrait of the king's jester Pablo de Valladolid was described by the French modernist Edouard Manet as the most astonishing piece of painting ever created. He praised the representation of air surrounding the figure and the way the background disappeared.

I have recently shown at the Madison Park Gallery in New York City. As part of Art Elevated, a larger than life reproduction of Sophia and the Little Man will hang on a NYC DOT street lamp in the Garment District in Manhattan from early September through October 30, 2018. Several works in my current body of work will be at The Shelfaudt Gallery at the University of Bridgeport Nov. 16, 2018 - Jan. 26, 2019. The gallery has featured important American artists like Robert Motherwell, Red Grooms, Louise Nevelson and Alice...

School of Visual Arts, New York City, MFA Computer Art, 1993
University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, BS Interdisciplinary Studies, 1984

RE:FORMATION, Gallery Madison Park, New York, NY, 2018
Nevertheless, She Persisted, Love Art Gallery, South Norwalk, CT, 2018
Artists of the Premier Collection, Gordon Fine Arts Gallery, Stamford, CT, 2017
Baba Yaga Eats, Fields Studio Gallery, New York, NY, 2016
Together Again, Firing Circuits Artists, St. Paul’s on the Green, Norwalk, CT, 2016
Close to the Edge, Katonah Museum Artists Association, Pound Ridge, NY, 2015
Time and Place, The Hammond Museum, North Salem, NY, 2015