The Diane and Sandy Besser Collection, Exhibition Catalog De Young Museum, San Francisco, CA Art on the Edge, Friends of Contemporary Art Juried Show Catalog, New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe, NM Loosely Joined, New Mexico Artists from the Creative Capital Professional Development Workshop, Exhibition Catalog, 516 Arts, Albuquerque, NM Bent on Sin, Exhibition Catalog, Parks Gallery, Taos, NM Insight Out!, Exhibition Catalog, Center for Contemporary Art, Santa Fe, NM Originals, Exhibition Catalog, Harwood Museum of Art, Taos, NM
Reviews
Art Slant, March 11, 2010
Albuquerque Journal North, February 6, 2010
Artnews, June 2008
Artweek, Oct. 2007 The East Bay Express, Aug 4, 2007 Albuquerque Journal North, May 18, 2007 Taos Magazine, March/April, 2007 Santa Fe Reporter, May 24-30, 2006 Pasatiempo! October 29-November 4, 2004 Pasatiempo! October, 2003 Taos Magazine, March/April, 2003 Taos News, December 2002 Santa Fe New Mexican, October, 2002 Santa Fe Reporter, October 2002 Albuquerque Journal North, November 2002 Santa Fean Magazine, December 2002 Albuquerque Journal North, October 2001 Taos News, Tempo, September 2001
Exhibitions
2017 Invitational Group Show, Gross Anatomies, Akron Art Museum, Akron Ohio 2011 Invitational Group Show, Face to Face, Gerald Peters Gallery, Santa Fe, NM
2011 Juried Group Show, New Mexorado, Harwood Museum of Art, Taos, NM
2010 Group Show, New Arrivals, New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe, NM
2010 Solo Show, 5 Drawings, Parks Gallery, Taos, NM
2010 Group Show, Heart This! 14 Artists Take on Valentines Day, Jay Etkin Gallery, Santa Fe, NM
2009 Group Show, Rebecca Hossack Art Gallery, London 2008 Art Santa Fe, Project Space:"Furies", Santa Fe, NM Group Show, Sponsored by Center for Contemporary Arts, Santa Fe, NM 2008 New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe, NM, Art On The Edge, Juried Group Show 2007 H. M. deYoung Museum, San Francisco, CA, The Sandy and Diane Besser Collection 2007 Bedford Gallery, Dean Lesher Center for the Arts, Walnut Creek, CA, Carney Art, Juried Group Show 2007 Gallery 516, Albuquerque, NM, Invitational Group Show 2007 Parks Gallery, Taos, NM, Bent on Sin, Solo Show 2007 Victoria Price Gallery, Santa FE, NM, Powermongers, Peacemakers, Invitational Group Show 2006 The Arts Center, St. Petersburg, FL, Turner Carrol Gallery, Santa Fe, NM, Juried Group Traveling Exhibition, Tomorrow’s Drawing Today 2005 Parks Gallery, Taos, NM The Shadow Islands, Solo Show 2004 The Roundhouse, Santa Fe, NM Invitational Group Show 2004 Addison Parks Gallery, It Figures, Invitational Group Show 2004 Center for Contemporary Art, Santa Fe, NM, Insight Out! Invitational Group Show 2003 Parks Gallery, Santa Fe, NM Redneck Bride, Solo Show 2002 Parks Gallery, Santa Fe, NM Solo Show 2001 The Harwood Museum, Taos, NM Juried Exhibition 1995 Joan Roebuck Gallery, Lafayette, CA Group Exhibition 1994 Bedford Contemporary Art Center, Walnut Creek, CA, Juried Exhibition 1993 Gallery Route One, Point Reyes, CA, Juried Exhibition
Good Press for Victoria Carlson
"I was also impressed with the humerous watercolors of middle-aged contortionists by Victoria Carlson, which simultaneously mocked and empowered their middle-aged subjects." Mark Van Proyen, Artweek, review of Carney Art at Bedford Gallery, Walnut Creek, CA
"Victoria Carlson morphs and contorts the human figure through watercolor vignettes in which myth, fantasy, comedy, history, nature and the everyday collide. Her characters peer out through twisted limbs, inviting the viewer into their tragicomic misbehavior." Elisabeth Sussman, Curator and Sandra Gilman Curator of Photography, Whitney Museum of American Art, Guest Curator, Art on the Edge Juried Show, Museum of New Mexico, Catalog Essay
“Victoria Carlson’s watercolors, for instance, depict dreamscapes no one show, not even Cirque du Soleil, could ever reproduce. Three of the Santa Fe, New Mexico artist’s paintings for the “Carny Art” exhibition depict a female contortionist whose act is competing with far more bizarre spectacles...” Kelly Vance, East Bay Express, Events, Review of Juried Group Show, Carney Art, Bedford Gallery, Walnut Creek, CA
“Carlson borrows the contortionist’s act as a broad metaphor for the extremes to which humans will stretch themselves in order to establish and maintain moral supremacy. Through subversive symbolism and silliness, she exhorts us to join her on the transgressive path-where she implies, we might actually encounter true transformation...” “Exquisitely drawn and well composed, the images compel the viewer to leave off examining technique for intense rumination on content.” Hollis Walker, Albuquerque Journal North, review of solo show, Bent on Sin, Parks Gallery, Taos NM
“If I’d had the guts to bludgeon the gallerist and steal just one work, it would have been Victoria Carlson’s Faith, Hope, Charity and the Tiny Pissed off Orchestra. You think the title says it all, but but it’s really the extra limbs, delicately rendered watercolor udders and, of course the wee people which sets it apart.” Zane Fischer, Santa Fe Reporter, review of Tomorrow’s Drawing Today Traveling juried group show, Turner Carrol Gallery, Santa Fe, NM
“...but Victoria Carlson’s tiny watercolor titled Mr. President, Are You Sure It Was God Speaking To You? proves that neither good painting nor cutting satire is dead.” Elizabeth Cook-Romero, The New Mexican, review of The Political Show
“I am most curious, as is painter Victoria Carlson, about who this madman-vandal is or was, and what was in his head. Her Cut-Story is a large, mixed media work depicting a man’s-the madman’s-naked back, stained like an immense bruise. In his left hand is a knife, and his head is the vandalized copy itself of “The Gay Academic” (edited by Louie Crew, ETC Publications 1978) The figure looms in a Caravaggio-like blackness that heightens its haunting weirdness.” Tom Collins, The Albuquerque Journal North, review of Insight out!
“Santa Fe watercolorist Victoria Carlson insists she has a hall pass with no expiration date-at least when it comes to her art. Trying to pigeonhole her is tougher than finding a parking place downtown at lunch time, but let’s just say that if you’re looking for a really apt analogy, consider pairing the Marquis Chimps, with the Marx Brothers in a Fellini Film. The result might be this series of strange, surreal and even zany watercolors.” Robert Nott, Pasa Tiempo, review of Parks Solo Show
“And last, but not least, my best of show goes hands down to Victoria Carlson’s three bizarre, creepy watercolor miniatures, particularly Waiting for my Special Friends which looks like something from a perverse Beatrix Potter Story for adult kids. Weird and absolutely exquisitely executed.” Tom Collins, The Albuquerque Journal North, review of Juried show, The Harwood Museum, Taos, NM
Thomas L Berkley Building Lobby Art, “Glass Wall” 10’ x 12’, Oakland, CA 2005 Ceiling Painting, Private Residence, Galisteo, NM, “ Galisteo Sky” 35’ x 46’ 2004 Painted Wall Mural for Public Art Project by Alexis Smith, Health & Human, 13’ x 62’, California State Capitol East Federal Building Project, March, 2003 Site Santa Fe 2001 Biennial, Site Specific Wall Painting for Alexis Smith, Red Carpet 14’ x 27’, Santa Fe, NM Painted Wall Mural for Oakland Museum/Oakland Airport, The Lei Show, 11’ x 80’ Oakland, CA Painted Wall Mural for The California Pioneer Society, The Laurencin Hauseworth Albums, California Views from 1860-1870, San Francisco, CA, 8’ x 28’ Painted Wall Mural for The California Pioneer Society, The Kiss of the Oceans: Commerce & Culture at the 1915 Worlds Fair, San Francisco, CA 8’ x 27’
Awards
San Francisco Art Commission, Temporary Art on Market, The Endangered Seed Project, 2006 Honor Studio Award, San Francisco Art Institute, 1987-1988