Aaron Curry (b. 1972, San Antonio) makes sculptures and paintings whose relationship to modernism is productively fraught. Incorporating a wealth of elements from popular culture—science fiction, video games, cartoons—Curry has developed a body of work that is both a recognizable continuation of art historical narratives and a caustic, critical, and often hilarious take on the established order. In recent years he has produced a group of large-scale aluminum sculptures that upend the classical poise of Alexander Calder, foregrounding instead a surreal biomorphism and seemingly improvised compositional flair. These objects translate the hands-on immediacy of his earliest sculptures at a municipal scale, emphasizing the democratic fervor that animates his project. An ongoing collage of the lineages of Disney, Picasso, and Chicago Imagism, Curry’s work provides a funhouse-mirror vision of the future of the Western tradition.

Curry has been the subject of solo exhibitions at The Ranch, Montauk, New York, NY (2022); deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, Lincoln, MA (2017–2021); McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, TX (2019); STPI Creative Workshop & Gallery, Singapore (2018); Bass Museum of Art, Miami, FL (2018); Rubell Family Collection, Miami, FL (2014); CAPC Musée d’Art Contemporain de Bordeaux, France (2014); Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, New York, NY (2013); and High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA (2012). Recent group exhibitions include New Ground: Jacob Samuel and Contemporary Etching, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY (2023); House in Motion / New Perspectives, de la Cruz Collection, Miami, FL (2023); Part 2: Au rendez-vous des amis: Modernism in Dialogue with Contemporary Art from the Sammlung Goetz, Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich, Germany (2021); and Jing’an Sculpture Park, Shanghai, China (2018). His work is in the permanent collections of institutions including the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; Minneapolis Institute of Arts, MN; Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, CA; Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, IL; and SFMOMA, San Francisco, CA; and Seattle Art Museum, WA. Curry lives and works in Los Angeles.