Nicole Cohen
Contemporary American Multimedia Artist
Overview
Nicole Cohen is a contemporary American multimedia artist whose work dynamically intersects time-based video installations, historical research, and drawing. Her practice routinely investigates the psychology of spaces, exploring the invisible power structures that govern social etiquette, performance anxiety, and the historical scripts of expected human behavior within both private and public life.
“Cohen works with images of historical places and creates performances that overlay onto the static photo frozen in time to the ever-changing reality of today, using people selected from the street to show what time we are living in today. The juxtaposition of the past and photo give us a better understanding of identity of how place and time can reveal our progress. Whether this ‘progress’ is about the development of mankind and how we live and grow, shaping new realities through time.”
Key Themes & Artistic Philosophy
The Concept of “Home”
A recurring anchor throughout Cohen’s career, “home” is treated not just as a physical structure, but as an amorphous repository—a place to rest, reboot, express personal style, self-reflect, and contemplate.
The Layering of Time
Cohen works heavily with video collage, recording the recent past or contemporary performers and seamlessly superimposing them into vintage magazines, books, or archival historical drawings. This time-lapse synthesis blurs the boundaries between past and present, challenging how history alters the ways we identify ourselves.
The Interior/Exterior Binary
Her projects often employ images of interiors to dissect the gap between contemporary comforts and our historical imaginings. Her French Connection project marked her first land-driven venture using interiors and exteriors simultaneously.
Education
Master of Fine Arts (MFA) — Roski School of Fine Arts, University of Southern California (USC), Los Angeles, CA
Bachelor of Arts (BA) — Hampshire College
Selected Museum Commissions & Exhibitions
Please Be Seated — J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA (2007–2009)
Commissioned by the Getty Center, this major interactive video installation invited visitors to sit in all-white replicas of historic French chairs from the museum’s permanent collection. Overhead screens seamlessly transported their real-time images back into the original, opulent 18th-century interiors from which the furniture originated.
My Vie en Rose — Williams College Museum of Art, Massachusetts
A solo museum exhibition exploring themes of identity, domesticity, and the cinematic imagination.
Super Vision — Zuccaire Gallery, Stony Brook University, Long Island, NY (2024)
A mid-career retrospective exhibition accompanied by a full artist catalog, Super Vision, produced in conjunction with the show.
Other Notable Institutions
Cohen’s work has been exhibited and celebrated globally, with features across the United States, Germany, France, Japan, Norway, Korea, and China. Institutional presentations include the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), the Fabric Workshop and Museum (Philadelphia, PA), and the Katzen Art Center at the American University Museum (Washington, D.C.).
International Experience
While building a career on an international stage, Cohen has worked out of major cultural centers including Berlin, Germany, where she lived and immersed herself in a historically charged environment while realizing her French Connection project. Her work has since been presented across Europe and Asia.
