Paul McCarthy American, b. 1945

Overview

White Snow, Balloon Dog, 2013

"We're really in a much more confused state than we've ever been. It's not McCarthy who's weird and gross, it's the world itself." -- PAUL MCCARTHY

Paul McCarthy is renowned for his provocative and often unsettling body of work spanning performance, film, sculpture, drawing, and installation. is renowned for his provocative and often unsettling body of work spanning performance, film, sculpture, drawing, and installation. Over a five-decade career, McCarthy has challenged cultural norms with pieces that are messy, sexually explicit, and politically charged—deliberately blurring the line between art and taboo. He frequently subverts familiar figures from pop culture—transforming them into grotesque parodies that critique consumerism, repression, and societal hypocrisy. By fusing high and low culture, McCarthy's anarchic art confronts viewers with the raw undercurrents of human behavior and belief.

McCarthy earned a BFA in painting from the San Francisco Art Institute in 1969, and an MFA in multimedia, film and art from USC in 1973. For 18 years, he taught performance, video, installation, and art history in the New Genres Department at UCLA, where he influenced future generations of west coast artists and he has exhibited extensively worldwide. McCarthy’s work comprises collaborations with artist-friends such as Mike Kelley and Jason Rhoades, as well as his son Damon McCarthy. His work is in the collections of the Guggenheim Museum in New York, the Tate Gallery in London, and the Smithsonian Museum of American Art in Washington, D.C., among others.

Biography

White Snow, Balloon Dog, 2013

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McCarthy has had a number of solo exhibitions at institutions including Tate Modern, London (2003); Haus der Kunst, Munich (2005); Moderna Museet, Stockholm (2006); S.M.A.K. Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst, Ghent (2007); Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (2008); and De Uithof, Utrecht, (2009). He lives and works in Los Angeles.

Works