Ian Hamilton Finlay: Fragments
8 May – 7 June 2025
David Nolan Gallery
24 East 81 Street, New York
Alongside global presentations at Victoria Miro in London and others, David Nolan will exhibit a presentation of 1970s-1990s works by one of Scotland's most celebrated creatives: Ian Hamilton Finlay (b. 1925 in Nassau, Bahamas; d. 2006, Edinburgh). The eight global exhibitions dedicated to Finlay next month, along with a new monograph, will coincide with what would have been his 100th birthday.
Finlay was a philosopher, sculptor, poet, and gardener with artwork in international collections including MoMA and the Tate. His oeuvre spans prints, poems, books, inscriptions, neons, sculptures, installations, and landscape design (by way of his famous 'living artwork' garden, Little Sparta).
Finlay will be the subject of eight coordinated international exhibitions opening around May 2025: in New York at David Nolan; London at Victoria Miro; Edinburgh at Ingleby Gallery; Palma de Mallorca at Kewenig; Brescia at Galleria Massimo Minini; Basel at Stampa Galerie; Vienna at Galerie Hubert Winter; and Hamburg at Sfeir-Semler Gallery.
For the David Nolan presentation, the exhibition is designed by the artist David Hartt, whose practice offers a curious interplay with Finlay's in the artists' deep shared engagement with language and design, and a similar approach that connects the past with the present through rigorous historical research. While Hartt's work in particular examines themes such as American imperialism and slavery, the two artists share a core practice of subverting existing objects or ideas by erasing and rewriting their histories to critique their underlying ideology. Hartt was deeply inspired by a 2022 visit to Little Sparta, a trip he considered to be a personal pilgrimage that cemented the two artists' commonalities.
More information is in the above-linked press release, and a preview of works on view is below. See the Dropbox folder linked above to download high-resolution image files. Artwork information is in each image’s file title. Image reuse must be credited as “courtesy of David Nolan Gallery and copyright of the artist”, unless otherwise noted in the file title.
