Martin Basher (b. 1979, New Zealand) received his BA (2003) and MFA (2008) from Columbia University, New York, where he lives and works.
For a nearly a decade, Basher’s practice has focused in on the forms and imagery of retail space. The sharp linear forms of commercial display materials, including acrylic sheet, mirror film, fluorescent lights and extruded aluminium, along with the saturated hues of liquor, mouthwash, hair products and holiday advertising have become an enduring lexicon for the artist.
Consumption is now an integral part of life and Basher’s practice is a consideration of the ways consumption sites and consumption choices reveal unspoken aspirations, longings and urges. In both his paintings and sculpture, Basher’s work echoes (and amplifies) retail strategy, arranging consumer goods on shelves and other display armatures, and situating these alongside paintings so flawless that they appear, graphic, almost digital. In a gallery setting, these arrangements read with all the trappings of ultra high-end retail. Yet unlike conventional retail display, Basher’s selections of goods upset the expected hierarchies and divisions between products. Instead, the products on display point to a more turgid construction of self. Aspirational objects sit alongside the quotidian, and public and private worlds collapse. Fine booze is parried with hair-loss cream, paintings with drain-opener. Bridle-leather becomes a prop for dirty work-out gear. A dusty sprinkle of illicit powder even coats the shelves. In product, the sketchy outlines of a fraught protagonist emerge. Basher invokes unspoken drives, the mundane and exclusive, the highbrow and lowbrow, and the public and private impulses that inform us as consuming individuals.
Basher is especially well known for his paintings that employ the explicitly abstract formal logic of vertical striping, but that might also be interpreted with a certain social content. With their hot orange and pink gradients there is a suggestion of sunset or dawn, of hot temperatures, and perhaps a nod to the climate change politics Basher has become increasingly concerned with in recent years. Further, work made in the United States over the 2018-2019 winter is inevitably inflected with the politics of government shutdowns, with the crude rhetoric of twitter postings and ugly nativist proclamations; for New York-based Basher it might not be a stretch to read a trace or contour of ‘beautiful barriers’ in the vertical striping of the paintings, and more explicitly so in the collages, where rigid geometry gives way to skewed angels and fugitive materiality, the suggestion of decay, collapse and failure.
Basher has exhibited widely internationally. He has been the recipient of the The La Brea Residency in Los Angeles, the McCahon Residency in Auckland, New Zealand, The AAI residency in New York, and the Susan Goodman Residency in Berlin and his work is featured in numerous public and private collections including The Agnes Gund Collection New York, The Majuda Collection Montreal, The Chartwell Collection, Auckland and James Wallace Collection, Auckland.
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2022–23
Sour Grapes, Martin Basher and Ben Buchanan, City Gallery Wellington, NZ
2021
Birds of Paradise, Starkwhite, Auckland NZ
Basher at Ath’s, Athfield House, Wellington NZ
2020
Birds of Paradise, Anat Ebgi, Los Angeles, CA
Marfa Invitational, Ballroom Marfa, Marfa, TX
2019
One Week Stand, Starkwhite, Auckland, NZ
2018
Strawberry Coconut Cream Pie, Anat Ebgi, Los Angeles, CA
2017
Devil at the Gates of Heaven, George Fraser Gallery, University of Auckland, Auckland, NZ
Hawaiian Tropic, Starkwhite Gallery, Auckland, NZ
The Armory Show, with Anat Ebgi, New York, NY
2015
A Guide to Benefits, Anat Ebgi, Los Angeles, CA
Jizzy Velvet, Starkwhite, Auckland, NZ
2014
Peppermint Schnapps, City Gallery of Wellington, Wellington, NZ
2013
Untitled, Starkwhite, Auckland, NZ
2012
Package and Handling, Saatchi & Saatchi, New York, NY
Armory Show, with Starkwhite, New York, NY
2011
Paradise Salé, Rockefeller Apartments, New York, NY
2010
States of Peace and Calm w. Personal Touch and Easy Ordering, Starkwhite, Auckland, NZ
High Class Boner Meds/Paradise Sale, Lopdell House, Titirangi, NZ
2009
Free Spirit No Interest, Starkwhite, Auckland, NZ
2008
The Spectacular Fall, Starkwhite, Auckland, NZ
2007
Martin Basher, Susan Inglett, New York, NY
2006
Blackwater, Hirschfeld Gallery, City Gallery Wellington, NZ
Fine Dining, High Street Project, Christchurch, NZ
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2024
We’ve Seen It All Before, Starkwhite, Auckland, NZ
2023
Permanent Collection, Auckland Art Gallery, Auckland New Zealand
The First Taste, Anat Ebgi New York, NY
Apple, Basher, Niesche, and Pardington, Starkwhite, Queenstown, NZ
2022
Basher, McGregor and Miller, Starkwhite, Auckland NZ
Sculpture on the Gulf, Waiheke Island, NZ
2021
Good Company: The Remix, Anat Ebgi, Los Angeles, CA
2020
Staycation, Anat Ebgi, Los Angeles, CA
2017
Im/material: Painting in the Digital Age, Sophia Contemporary Gallery, London, UK
Art Los Angeles Contemporary, with Anat Ebgi, Los Angeles, CA
2016
miart, with Anat Ebgi, Milan, IT
Subliminal Shifts, Tracy Williams Gallery, New York, NY
2014
Martin Basher, Henry Codax, Brand New Gallery, Milan IT
On The Blue Shore of Silence, Tracy Williams Gallery, New York, NY
Duck Rabbit, curated by Jason Bailer-Losh, Anat Ebgi, LA
Display, curated by Barry Rosenberg, Contemporary Art Galleries, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT
Anomie, Dowd Gallery, State University of New York, Cortland, NY
2013
Freedom Farmers, curated by Natasha Conland, Auckland Art Gallery, Auckland New Zealand
Sydney Contemporary Art Fair, Sydney, AU
Auckland Art Fair, Auckland, NZ
Sweatpanting, Orgy Park, Brooklyn, NY
2012
Toi Aotearoa, Auckland Art Gallery, Auckland, NZ
Strangers In A Strange Land, LMAK, New York, NY
Group Show, Starkwhite, Auckland, NZ
Temptations, Extra Extra, Philadelphia, PA
2011
Group Show, Starkwhite, Auckland, NZ
Chinese Takeout, Art in General, New York, NY
2010
Total Recall, The Public Art Fund, MetroTech Plaza, Brooklyn, NY
Collected, Cuchifritos, New York, NY
Unspecific Objects, Thierry Goldbery Projects, New York, NY
The Grand Century, Grand Rapids Art Museum, Grand Rapids, MI
Dancing Feet, curated by Colby Bird & Tova Carlin, 179 Canal, New York, NY
Light Black and Silver, Mahara Gallery, Waikanae, NZ
2009
Heavier Than A Death In The Family, 25CPW, New York, NY
Two Degrees of Separation, Gallery Satori, New York, NY
Autumn, Neiman Gallery, Columbia University, New York, NY
Magazine, Gambia Castle, Auckland, NZ
Reality Sandwiches, Artnews Projects, Berlin, DE
The Perfect Human, Dorsch Gallery, Miami, FL
The Armory Show, for Socrates Sculpture Park. New York, NY
2008
Spaghetti Junction, 64zero3 Gallery, Christchurch, NZ
The New Academy, Lehman Art Center, North Andover, MA
Emerging Artist Fellowship Exhibition, Socrates Sculpture Park, Queens, NY
Summer Mixtape, Exit Art, New York, NY
Prescience, Dorsch Gallery, Miami, FL
M.F.A. Thesis Exhibition. Fisher-Landau Center, Queens, NY
Supernatural. Thierry Goldberg Projects, New York, NY
2007
ARTSPACE Editions. ARTSPACE, Auckland, NZ
Vanishing Point, Mary Newton Gallery, Wellington, NZ
Dream Wheels, Mahara Gallery, Waikanae, NZ
First Year MFA Exhibition. Columbia University, New York, NY
2006
HEADWAY. ARTSPACE, Auckland, NZ
Western Way. Mary Newton Gallery, Wellington, NZ
CURATORIAL PROJECTS
2010
Lovers, Starkwhite, Auckland, NZ; Kevin Appel, Martin Basher, Whitney Bedford, Tamar Halpern, Amy Howden-Chapman, Kate Newby, Peter Nicholls, Brie Ruais, Layla Rudneva-MacKay, David Scanavino and Gordon Walters
2009
Dance Sons and Daughters Dance!, The Physics Room, Christchurch, NZ, and Gambia Castle, Auckland, NZ, Leigh Ledare, Rashawn Griffin, Mads Lynnerup, Colby Bird and Wu Ingrid Tsang
2008
The Leisure Suite, Leroy Neiman Gallery, Columbia University, New York, NY, Beth Campbell, Tim Davis, Friedrich Kurnath, Matt Keegan, Keren Cytter, Kate Gilmore, Michael Schmelling, Divya Mehra, Ben Turner