• JAMES SIENA
    Anion, 2023
    Acrylic and graphite on linen
    75 x 59 inches
    190.5 x 149.9 cm
  • JAMES SIENA
    Striata, 2023
    Acrylic and graphite on linen
    60 x 48 inches
    152.4 x 121.9 cm
  • JAMES SIENA
    7.2024RVDT, 2024
    Acrylic and graphite on linen
    58 x 45 inches
    147 x 114 cm
  • Elutea (detail), 2024.
  • JAMES SIENA
    Elutea, 2024
    Acrylic and graphite on linen
    60 x 86 inches
    152.4 x 218.4 cm
  • "In Elutea (2024), a wide-bodied, one-color work, the artist’s tightly fitted pirouettes and turns are nearly unfathomable. It is almost as if we’re engaged with sound waves, or the wiggle of desert mirages.  Though it is as systematically careful as it is sprawling, Elutea remains a generative engine of novel textures. Obsession accounts for one attribute of these luxurious accumulations. And persistence seconds the motion. Though extremely fine lines saturate Elutea, they never stop short or fail to advance the picture. From another point of view, their fineness might seem vulnerable, as if some nut with scissors could clip and shred them in a trice. Yet nothing unravels in this painting or undermines the muscular achievement of its presence."

    - Geoffrey Young in "James Siena, The Doing"

  • JAMES SIENA
    Phenotasp, 2024
    Acrylic and graphite on linen
    60 x 48 inches
    152.4 x 121.9 cm
  • Phenotasp (detail), 2024.
  • JAMES SIENA
    Cephaelin, 2025
    Acrylic on linen
    70 x 56 inches
    177.8 x 142.2 cm
  • JAMES SIENA
    Écrouleron, 2025
    Acrylic on linen
    80 x 63 inches
    203.2 x 160 cm
  • JAMES SIENA
    Naecemoa, 2025
    Acrylic on linen
    60 x 48 inches
    152.4 x 121.9 cm
  • "Pre-internet, one didn’t hear the word 'algorithm' all that often. But since the late eighties Siena has been at the forefront of knowing that an algorithm can be a tool for calculating and colonizing visual space. Put to work, a structural building block can generate complexes of ocular delight.  If I do this, and then this, and then this again . . . If the results of his procedures lead a viewer to think of nets, weavings, untold channels of information, so be it. Saturated with screen imagery in a digital age, we feel a kinship with Siena’s dense arrays. And if we stand back, remain open, and let a work hit us? It’s not a crime for painting to reflect the excitement and anxiety we all share in an era of unbridled commercialization."

    - Geoffrey Young in "James Siena, The Doing"

  • JAMES SIENA
    1.RVDT, 2024
    Acrylic and graphite on linen
    18 x 24 inches
    45.7 x 61 cm
  • JAMES SIENA
    2.RVDT, 2024
    Acrylic and graphite on linen
    18 x 24 inches
    45.7 x 61 cm
  • JAMES SIENA
    L'Émeutière, 2024
    Acrylic on linen
    18 x 24 inches
    45.7 x 61 cm
  • James Siena's studio, New York, NY, 2025.
  • JAMES SIENA (b. 1957 in Oceanside, CA) received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY. For over...
    James Siena in his studio, New York, NY, 2025.

    JAMES SIENA (b. 1957 in Oceanside, CA) received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY. For over two decades, the artist has taught at New York’s School of Visual Arts in the Masters of Fine Arts department. He is a board member of the Herbert F. Johnson Museum Advisory Council at Cornell University, Ithaca, NY. In 2021, Siena was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in Fine Arts by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, New York, NY.

     

    Siena’s work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Baronian, Brussels, Belgium; Dieu Donné, New York, NY; Galerie Xippas, Paris, France; Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY; Miles McEnery Gallery, New York, NY; The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; Pace Gallery, New York, NY; Pace Prints, New York, NY; Pierogi 2000, Brooklyn, NY; The Print Center, Philadelphia, PA; Ratio 3, San Francisco, CA; and the University Art Museum, University of Albany, Albany, NY; among others.

     

    The artist has participated in group exhibitions at the American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York, NY; Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY; The FLAG Art Foundation, New York, NY; Heckscher Museum of Art, Huntington, NY; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY; Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI; The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, NY; Museum of Fine Arts Boston, Boston, MA; Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Houston, TX; The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, Long Island City, NY; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; and elsewhere.

     

    His work is in numerous institutional collections including the British Museum, London, United Kingdom; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY; Museum of Fine Arts Boston, Boston, MA; Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Houston, TX; The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA; and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY.

     

    The artist lives and works in New York, NY and Otis, MA.

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