Bruce Nauman

The contemporary artist, Bruce Nauman, was born 1941 in Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA. He initially studied physics at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and later got an arts degree from the University of California at Davis, where he also showed his first experimental art works.  He became perhaps the most influential US artist of his generation. Nauman is now based in Galisteo, New Mexico, USA.

The Walker Arts Center of Minneapolis in collaboration with the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, and the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, organised a retrospective of his major works, which was shown in itinerating exhibitions between 1993 and 1995 in several prestigious musea, including the Museum of Modern Arts in New York. His works have been exhibited since in many countries, most recently in Venice, Italy, where he was already awarded the Golden Lion of the 1999 Biennale. He has also experimented videos and other art forms, such as photography, neon and performance.

His 2005 installation One Hundred Fish Fountain (partial view above) is made up of 97 bronze fish attached to a steel frame and punctured by holes from which they spurt water. The water is collected in a basin and pumped back through tubes. The installation was first shown in the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal, Canada.