Oscar Tuazon


Oscar Tuazon is an American artist based in Los Angeles who works in sculpture, architecture, and mixed media.

Early life

Oscar Tuazon was born Oscar Hansen on July 9, 1975, in a geodesic dome his parents built in the woods at Indianola, Kitsap County, Washington. He attended Deep Springs College, Cooper Union, and the Whitney Independent Study Program. In 2001 he served as a founding board member at the Center for Urban Pedagogy in New York with his former Deep Springs classmate Damon Rich.
Oscar met and married Lan Tuazon in New York in the mid-90s and changed his name from Oscar Hansen to Oscar Tuazon. The couple would later be divorced, but he kept the last name. His brother and frequent collaborator, Elias Hansen, is also an artist.

Career

Professionally, he began his career working in the Studio Acconci of architect/artist Vito Acconci. After moving to Paris in 2007, he began exhibiting widely in Europe. He has since then exhibited at the Venice Biennale, the Whitney Biennial, and many group and solo shows throughout the world, and is in major art collections such as Saatchi's.
A critic in the art magazine Frieze wrote in 2013 that "like his heroes, from Gordon Matta-Clark to wilderness survivalists, Tuazon’s non-conformist approach to artistic practice plays at the juncture of architecture, sculpture and performance." A New York Times review described his work as "haunting... pit Mr. Acconci's robust ego against Mr. Tuazon's raw and fragile subjectivity."

Personal life

In 2013, he moved from France to the Silver Lake neighborhood of Los Angeles with his three children and wife Dorothée Perret, a former editor at Purple Magazine who now helms the art magazine "Paris, LA."

Exhibitions

; 2007
; 2008
; 2009
; 2010
; 2011
; 2012
; 2013
; 2014
Nominated for the Prix Fondation d'entreprise Ricard in 2009.