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Tabboo!

Tabboo! (Stephen Tashjian, b. 1959, Leicester, Massachusetts) renders his subjects in a direct, intuitive style that he terms “emotional realism,” suspending figurative elements against dreamlike colorfields. Working primarily in acrylic, the artist often draws subjects from his surroundings, depicting cityscapes, friends, or flora and fauna in imaginative still lifes or tableaux. He also paints large, panoramic works and site-specific murals. These immersive settings recall the painted backdrops he made for performances in the 1980s and 1990s. While performing regularly himself, Tabboo! also designed numerous event fliers, posters, and album covers featuring his signature curvilinear text, which still appears in his work. Tabboo! lives in New York.

Recent solo exhibitions include Karma, Los Angeles (2023) and New York (2022, 2020); Gordon Robichaux, New York (2022, 2020, 2019, 2017); and Howl! Happening, New York (2016). His work is held in the collections of the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami: Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Portland Museum of Art, Maine; and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.

Single work, Tabboo!

Born 1959, Worcester, Massachusetts

Lives and works in New York

EDUCATION

1981

BFA, Massachusetts College of Art

Selected Solo and Two-Person Exhibitions

2023

Karma, Los Angeles, Nothing but blue skies from now on

2022

Karma and Gordon Robichaux, New York, Cityscapes

2020

Karma and Gordon Robichaux, New York, Tabboo! 1983-1988

2019

Gordon Robichaux, New York, Garden, Elisabeth Kley & Tabboo!

2017

Gordon Robichaux, New York, World of Tabboo! Early and Recent Work

2016

Howl! Happening, New York, TABBOO! New Paintings

2008

Participant Inc., New York, The Nightingale

2006

Paul Kasmin Gallery, New York

1999

Rupert Goldsworthy Gallery, New York

1998

Wooster Gardens, New York, Tabboo! Paintings

1995

Tricia Collins Grand Salon, New York, Tabboo!

Rupert Goldsworthy Gallery, Berlin, Berlin Welcomes Tabboo!

Allez les Filles, Columbus, Ohio, A Kiss of Spring in the Dead of Winter

1994

Tom Cugliani Gallery, New York, Tabboo!

Papi Luis Cafe, New York, Small Spring Paintings on Paper

1991

Big Drop, New York, Paintings by Tabboo!

1987

Valorie Furlano Gallery, Providence, Rhode Island

1986

Limbo Gallery, New York, The Glitter Paintings

1982

ABC No Rio, New York

Lucky Strike Gallery, New York

1981

11th Hour Gallery, Boston

Selected Group Exhibitions

2024

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Shifting Landscapes

70 Main Street, Thomaston, Maine, A Particular Kind of Heaven

Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, Texas, Who’s Afraid of Cartoony Figuration?, curated by Alison M. Gingeras

2023

Brooklyn Museum, New York, Copy Machine Manifestos: Artists Who Make Zines

MassArt Art Museum, Boston, Massachusetts, The Myth of Normal: A Celebration of Authentic Expression

Carolyn Campagna Kleefeld Contemporary Art Museum, Long Beach, California, Drag Show

Parker Gallery, Los Angeles, Wishing Well

Honor Fraser Gallery, Los Angeles, Make Me Feel Mighty Real: Drag/Tech and the Queer Avatar

2022-23

UCCA Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing, China, Somewhere Downtown

2022

Berkshire Botanical Garden, Stockbridge, Massachusetts, Symbiosis, curated by Beth Rudin DeWoody

Derosia, New York, The Practice of Everyday Life

McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, DONALD MOFFETT + NATURE CULT + THE McNAY

2021

Karma, New York, Get Lifted!, organized by Hilton Als

Anton Kern Gallery, New York, 11

Massimo de Carlo, VSpace, Some Art That Got Me Through 2020, curated by Rob Pruitt

2020

Karma, New York, (Nothing but) Flowers

Jewish Museum, New York, We Fight to Build a Free World: An Exhibition by Jonathan Horowitz

Artist Curated Projects, Los Angeles, By Appointment

Provincetown Arts Society, Massachusetts, Intimate Companions, organized by Joe Sheftel

Parker Gallery, Los Angeles, A Page From My Intimate Journal, Part II–

Tom of Finland Foundation, Los Angeles, Heaven and Hell, organized by Seth Bogart and Jess Scott

2019

Grey Art Gallery, New York University; Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum, Miami, Florida;

Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus, Ohio, Art after Stonewall, 1969-1989

The Savannah College of Art and Design, Savannah, Georgia, The Artist as Muse; Self-Portraiture in Contemporary Art

Western Exhibitions, Chicago, Pure ‘Joy’, organized by INVISIBLE EXPORTS

Herald St., London, Condo London

Johannes Vogt, New York, Summer of ’82, organized by Dan Cameron

2018

Participant Inc., New York, Breaking Wave

Alberta Merola Gallery, Provincetown, Massachusetts, HEADTOHEAD

2017

Museum of Modern Art, New York, Club 57: Film, Performance, and Art in the East Village, 1978-1983

White Columns, New York, White Columns Benefit Auction

Gavlak Gallery, Los Angeles, Flaming June VII (Flaming Creatures)

Collette, Paris, Candy Magazine at Colette, organized by Luis Venegas

2015

Shoot the Lobster, New York, Charmed

University Galleries, University of Nevada, Reno, Tomorrow’s Man, organized by Jack Pierson

Launch F18, New York, Inside the Episodee, organized by Jack Pierson

Howl! Happening, New York, Secrets of the Great Pyramid

2014

Matthew Marks Gallery, New York, A Drawing Show

2010

Vox Populi Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Dead Flowers

Albert Merola Gallery, Provincetown, Massachusetts, Night

2009

Centro Galego de Arte Contemporanea, Santiago de Compostela, Spain, Familiar Feelings. On the Boston Group

Andrew Edlin Gallery, New York, Out of Order, organized by Scott Hug

2007

JGM Galerie, Paris, French Kiss, organized by Rob Wynne

2006

Paul Kasmin Gallery, New York, the Name of This Show Is Not: Gay Art Now, organized by Jack Pierson

2004

The Migros Museum für Gegenwartskuns, Zurich, The Future Has a Silver Lining. Genealogies of Glamour

New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, East Village USA

2003

Gavin Brown’s enterprise, New York, Surreal Estate, organized by Jonathan Horowitz and Rob Pruitt

1996

Allez les Filles, Columbus, Ohio, Summer 1996

1995

Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), Boston, The Boston School, organized by Lia Gangitano

UFO Gallery, Provincetown, Massachusetts, Flowers

1994

Four Walls, Brooklyn, That Obscure Object of Desire, organized by Dan Cameron and Marilla Palmer

Leslie Lohman, New York, Diamonds, Gold, Myrhh

P.S.122 Gallery, New York, Fierce N.Y.

White Columns, New York, White Columns Benefit Auction

Marshall Arts Studios, Memphis, Tennessee, Fierce N.Y.

L’école des Beaux-Arts, Lorient, Brittany, France, Le Temps D’un Dessin

24 Hours for Life Gallery, Pride in Our Diversity, organized by Ronny Cohen, New York

450 Broadway Gallery, New York, Open Book, organized by Larry Krone

1993

Tom Cugliani Gallery, New York, Saint in the City, organized by Jack Pierson

Tom Cugliani Gallery, New York, Daniel Ibanez, Dan McCarthy, Stephen Tashjian

Leslie Lohman Gallery, New York

Barbara Braathen Gallery, New York, Urban Analysis, organized by Maynard Monrow

Tom Cugliani Gallery, New York, Summer Drawing Show

1992

Tom Cugliani Gallery, New York, Some People, organized by Jack Pierson

1991

The New Museum, New York, with Gran Fury and Annie Sprinkle
St. Lawrence University, Canton, NY, From Desire…A Queer Diary, organized by Nan Goldin
PS122 Gallery, New York

1989

Artists Space, New York, Witness: Against our Vanishing, organized by Nan Goldin
The New Leonard Beach Hotel, Miami, Interpretations

1988

598 Broadway Gallery, New York, Pure Joy, organized by Hebe Joy

1987

ASYLUM, New York, A Slice of Life

1986

Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indiana, Painting and Sculpture Today
Limbo gallery, New York, Art as Theater… …Theater as Art, Act I

1985

Pat Hearn Gallery, New York
Limbo Gallery, New York, Theatre as Art

1984

ABC No Rio, New York, the edge

1983

Piezo Electric, New York, 29 Artists from The Lower East Side

1981

Artists Space, New York, Witness: Against our Vanishing, organized by Nan Goldin

PUBLIC COLLECTIONS

Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami

Museum of Fine Arts, Houston

Museum of Modern Art, New York City

Portland Museum of Art, Maine

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City

PUBLICATIONS

2022

Cityscapes
Texts by Ksenia M. Soboleva, Jonathan D. Katz, and Eileen Myles
Gordon Robichaux/Karma, New York, 2022
264 pages, hardcover
11 1⁄4 × 10 1⁄2 inches

2021

Tabboo! 1982-88
Text by Jarrett Earnest
Gordon Robichaux/Karma Books, New York
140 pages, hardcover
11 1⁄4 × 10 1⁄2 inches

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