Rebecca Ness paints scenes from everyday life, capturing people and places alongside the clutter and accoutrements that define them – a friend’s face illuminated by the glow of a phone screen outside a bar, her studio floor strewn with paint tubes and half-finished crossword puzzles, or hands clasped over frosty drinks in a car. Her paintings are vivid vignettes that are both engaging and approachable, rich with personal resonance. They explore themes of queer identity with a remarkable lightness of touch, technical precision, and visual wit. Ness’s work embodies a playfully self-aware sensibility, often presenting a wry performance of painting itself: the artist caught mid-act in her studio, surrounded by a lively chaos of paint tubes, palettes, discarded paper, and splattered walls – a jubilant celebration of the texture and materiality of her craft. Her art is as much about people as it is about the objects and spaces that shape their lives. Drawing inspiration from figures such as Norman Rockwell, Nicole Eisenman, Philip Guston, and her artistic hero, Lucian Freud, Ness’s unconventional still lifes offer a sharp yet affectionate portrait of America. Her work is imbued with wit, warmth, and a keen eye for the humour and beauty inherent in modern existence.
Ness earned an MFA from Yale School of Art and a BFA from Boston University. Her work has featured in recent group exhibitions at the SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah, and the Akron Art Museum, Akron. Her paintings are held in prominent public collections, including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA), San Francisco; Moderna Museet, Stockholm; Albertina Museum, Vienna; Long Museum, Shanghai; and SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah.
