Dan Colen

Daniel Colen (born 1979, New Jersey) is an artist based in New York. His work consists of painted sculptures appropriating low-cultural ephemera, graffiti-inspired paintings of text executed in paint, and installations.

Born and raised in Leonia, New Jersey, Colen graduated with a BFA in Painting from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2001.

Colen’s work has been exhibited at galleries including Deitch Projects, Gagosian Gallery (2006) and Barbara Gladstone Gallery in New York, Peres Projects in Berlin, as well as Venus and OHWOW in Los Angeles. He has shown work internationally in many exhibitions including “Potty Mouth, Potty War, Pot Roast, Pot is a Reality Kick” at Gagosian Gallery in New York, “USA Today” at the Royal Academy of Arts in London, the 2006 Whitney Biennial in New York, “Fantastic Politics” at the National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design in Oslo and “No Me” at Peres Projects in Berlin. In 2011 he had a solo show at the Astrup Fearnley Museum in Oslo, Norway. He is represented by the Gagosian Gallery in New York and by Massimo de Carlo in Milan, Italy.

In "Secrets and Cymbals, Smoke and Scissors: My Friend Dash’s Wall in the Future" (2004), Colen built an exact replica of a section of poster, photo and flyer-covered wall from friend Dash Snow's apartment. Each piece of visual material was handmade and attached to a Styrofoam copy of the wall.

His works are held in the collection of the Saatchi Gallery, The Whitney Museum, and The Astrup Fearnley Museum.

His father, Sy Colen, a wood and clay sculptor, was a participant in the 2006 reality TV show Artstar.