b. 1970
Born in Cambridge, England, painter Jenny Saville is an original member of the Young British Artists, and is best known for her large-scale oil paintings of nude women. She studied at Glasgow School of Art from 1988 to 1992, spending a term at the University of Cincinnati in 1991 where she enrolled in women’s studies, focussing her interest in “imperfections” of flesh. She was appointed as lecturer at The Slade School of Fine Arts between 2000 – 2006. She currently lives and works between London and Palermo, Italy.
In her figurative paintings, Saville challenges the limits of the genre and raises questions about society’s perception of the body. She has been credited with originating a new and challenging method of painting the female nude, transcending the boundaries of classical figuration and modern abstraction.
She has exhibited her work in solo shows at Pace McGill Gallery, New York; Gagosian Gallery, New York; Gagosian Gallery, LA; Museo d’Arte Contemporanea Roma, Rome; Gagosian Gallery, London; Norton Museum of Art, Florida and Modern Art Oxford.
7 min read
Jenny Saville: up, down and back under the spell
