Alex Gardner (b. 1987, Los Angeles, CA) lives and works in Long Beach, California. He received his BFA from California State University, Long Beach in 2011.

Gardner’s paintings depict luminous figures set against stark, monochromatic grounds. Stripped of individual markers and facial features, the figures exist outside specific identities, times, or narratives, becoming vessels for projection rather than portraiture. This absence does not signal erasure or loss, instead, it proposes a more expansive, universal vision of human experience, unburdened by performance, language, or recognition.

Through close cropping, ambiguous gestures, and heightened color relationships, Gardner captures moments of intimacy, tension, care, and isolation. His figures hover between states of rising and falling, connection and estrangement, comfort and vulnerability, evoking psychological and emotional thresholds rather than fixed events. Color plays a central role in this atmosphere, infusing each scene with an emotional tenor that oscillates between tenderness and unease.

Working across painting and sculpture, Gardner reflects on mental fatigue, belonging, and endurance within contemporary life. Subtly informed by his own experiences navigating identity and community in America, his practice resists easy categorization or didactic interpretation. Instead, Gardner creates open-ended spaces that invite viewers to confront their own perceptions, assumptions, and capacities for empathy, offering art not as resolution, but as solace, reflection, and sustained attention.

Gardner has presented solo exhibitions at Perrotin (New York), X Museum (Beijing), Mine Project (Hong Kong), Long Beach Museum of Art (Long Beach, CA), Loyal (Stockholm), Koenig (Berlin), The Hole (New York), SCAD Museum of Art (Savannah, GA), and New Image Art Gallery (Los Angeles). His work has been included in group exhibitions at venues such as Lehmann Maupin (London), James Fuentes (New York), The Hole (Los Angeles), and the Metropolitan Museum (Manila). Gardner’s work is held in the public collections of the Detroit Institute of Arts, Museo Jumex (Mexico City), Institute of Contemporary Art Miami, Pérez Art Museum (Miami), X Museum (Beijing), and the Studio Museum in Harlem.

Education

2011 BFA, California State University, Long Beach, CA

Solo Exhibitions

2024
Psychic Stamina, Perrotin, New York, NY

2023
Good Luck, X Museum, Beijing, China

2022
Drawing No Conclusions, Mine Project, Hong Kong

2021
We All Exist Right Now, Long Beach Museum of Art, Long Beach, CA
Happy To Be Here, Loyal, Stockholm, Sweden
Free For All, König, Berlin, Germany

2020
Blues, The Hole, New York, NY

2019
Guest Room, SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah, GA
Snooze Button, Mine Project, Hong Kong
Amnesia, Carl Kostyál Gallery, London, England

2017
RomCom, The Hole, New York, NY

2016
Laugh Now Cry Now, New Image Art, West Hollywood, CA

2015
What is your reason for visiting?, The Dot Project, London, England

Group Exhibitions

2025
Femmes, Curated by Pharrell Williams, Perrotin, Paris, France

2024
Point of Contact, Loyal, Stockohlm, Sweden
30 Years of NIA, New Image Art, Los Angeles, CA
Metaphor to Metamophosis, Konig Gallery, Munich, Germany

2023
You Need a Mango to Give a Mango, New Image Art, Los Angeles, CA
Beneath the Surface, Lehmann Maupin, London, England
Storage Wars, The Hole, Los Angeles, CA
Sounds of Blackness, Met Museum Manila, Manila, Philippines

2022
Psychic Distance: Powers of Observing Relationships, Loyal, Stockholm, Sweden
New Construction, The Hole, Los Angeles, CA

2021
Stockholm Sessions, Carl Kostyál Gallery, Stockholm, Sweden

2019
The Gaze, James Fuentes Gallery, New York, NY
Malmö Sessions, Carl Kostyál Gallery, Malmö, Sweden

2018
Body, Curtain, Advance, Loyal, Stockholm, Sweden
GDPR: Group Display of Paintings and Renderings, Signal, Brooklyn, NY

2017
Lil Swim, The Luggage Room, San Francisco, CA
New Image Art, VOLTA NY, New York, NY

2016
Hawaii Swim 5.0, New Image Art, West Hollywood, CA
Winter Invitational, Jonathan LeVine Projects, New York, NY

2015
Amor Fati, 111 Minna Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Collections

Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami, FL
Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, MI
Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), Miami, FL
Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY
X Museum, Beijing, China
Museo Jumex, Mexico City, Mexico