Maureen Paley (born 1953Sleeman, Elizabeth (ed.) ''The International Who's Who of Women'' (London and New York: Routledge, 2002), p. 431. Entry on Paley available as snippet vie
here
/ref>) is the

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, p ...

owner of a contemporary art gallery in

Bethnal Green Bethnal Green is an area in London, England, and is located in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is in east London and part of the East End of London, East End. The area emerged from the small settlement which developed around the common la ...

, London, where she lives. It was founded in 1984, called Interim Art during the 1990s, and renamed Maureen Paley in 2004. She exhibited

Young British Artists The Young British Artists, or YBAs—also referred to as Brit artists and Britart—is a loose group of visual artists who first began to exhibit together in London in 1988. Many of the YBA artists graduated from the BA Fine Art course at Golds ...

at an early stage. Artists represented include

Turner Prize The Turner Prize, named after the English painter J. M. W. Turner, is an annual prize presented to a British visual artist. Between 1991 and 2016, only artists under the age of 50 were eligible (this restriction was removed for the 2017 award). ...

winners

Lawrence Abu Hamdan Lawrence Abu Hamdan (born 1985, Amman) is a contemporary artist based in Dubai. His work looks into the political effects of listening, using various kinds of audio to explore its effects on human rights and law. Because of his work with sound, ...

Gillian Wearing Gillian Wearing CBE, RA (born 10 December 1963) is an English conceptual artist, one of the Young British Artists, and winner of the 1997 Turner Prize. In 2007 Wearing was elected as lifetime member of the Royal Academy of Arts in London. H ...

and

Wolfgang Tillmans Wolfgang Tillmans (born 16 August 1968) is a German Fine-art photography, photographer. His diverse body of work is distinguished by observation of his surroundings and an ongoing investigation of the photographic medium’s foundations. Tillman ...

. One thing in common with many of the artists represented is their interest in addressing social issues. The gallery is located at 60 Three Colts Lane. Maureen Paley opened a space in

Hove Hove ( ) is a seaside resort in East Sussex, England. Alongside Brighton, it is one of the two main parts of the city of Brighton and Hove. Originally a fishing village surrounded by open farmland, it grew rapidly in the 19th century in respon ...

called Morena di Luna in 2017 and in 2021 opened Studio M at Rochelle School near

Shoreditch Shoreditch is an area in London, England and is located in the London Borough of Hackney alongside neighbouring parts of Tower Hamlets, which are also perceived as part of the area due to historic ecclesiastical links. Shoreditch lies just north ...

Early life and education

Maureen Paley was born in

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

. She attended

Sarah Lawrence College Sarah Lawrence College (SLC) is a Private university, private liberal arts college in Yonkers, New York, United States. Founded as a Women's colleges in the United States, women's college in 1926, Sarah Lawrence College has been coeducational ...

, and graduated from

Brown University Brown University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. It is the List of colonial colleges, seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the US, founded in 1764 as the ' ...

in 1975. She emigrated to

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

in 1977, attending the

Royal College of Art The Royal College of Art (RCA) is a public university, public research university in London, United Kingdom, with campuses in South Kensington, Battersea and White City, London, White City. It is the only entirely postgraduate art and design uni ...

from 1978 to 1980, where she gained an MA in photography.

Career

1980s

In 1984, Paley began a gallery programme in her Victorian terraced house. During the late 1980s, she exhibited examples of

contemporary art Contemporary art is a term used to describe the art of today, generally referring to art produced from the 1970s onwards. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a ...

Tim Rollins and K.O.S. Tim Rollins (June 10, 1955 – December 22, 2017) was an American artist who together with the art collaborative K.O.S. formed the art-group Tim Rollins and K.O.S (Kids of Survival).

Sarah Charlesworth Sarah Edwards Charlesworth (March 29, 1947 – June 25, 2013) was an American conceptual artist and photographer. She is considered part of The Pictures Generation, a loose-knit group of artists working in New York in the late 1970s and early ...

, Charles Ray, Mike Kelley,

Michelangelo Pistoletto Michelangelo Pistoletto (born 23 June 1933) is an Italian painter, action and object artist, and art theorist. Pistoletto is acknowledged as one of the main representatives of the Italian Arte Povera. His work mainly deals with the subject mat ...

and Günther Förg.Deepwell, Katy
New Feminist Art Criticism
(Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995), p. 97.

1990s

In the early 1990s, the gallery presented several exhibitions made by the burgeoning group of artists that were to become known as the YBAs—including,

Henry Bond Henry Bond, FHEA (born 13 June 1966) is an English writer, photographer, and visual artist. In his ''Lacan at the Scene'' (2009), Bond made contributions to theoretical psychoanalysis and forensics. In 1990, with Sarah Lucas, Bond organise ...

Angela Bulloch Angela Bulloch (born 1966 in Rainy River, Ontario, Canada), is a Canadian artist who often works with sound and installation; she is recognised as one of the Young British Artists. Bulloch lives and works in Berlin. Life and career Bulloch stud ...

and

Liam Gillick Liam Gillick (born 1964) is a British artist. In the 1990s he was one of the informal Young British Artists group; like many of them, he took a degree in fine art from Goldsmiths' College, in London. He was among the artists included in the ...

.Renton, Andrew. "Museum wannabes", ''

Evening Standard The ''London Standard'', formerly the ''Evening Standard'' (1904–2024) and originally ''The Standard'' (1827–1904), is a long-established regional newspaper published weekly and distributed free newspaper, free of charge in London, Engl ...

'': London, p47, 23 April 2002. "In her Hackney living room, Maureen Paley showed the Young British Artists when they were even Younger" For years she developed the careers of

and

."The gallery owner"
''

'', 17 December 2001. Retrieved 12 August 2010. She was called by '' Time Out'' "a true pioneer of the East End", having presented work there before it was fashionable. For almost a decade, the gallery was supported by

Arts Council An arts council is a government or private non-profit organization dedicated to promoting the arts; mainly by funding local artists, awarding prizes, and organizing arts events. They often operate at arms-length from the government to prevent pol ...

grants and other patronage. In September 1999, the gallery moved to Herald Street in Bethnal Green,"Gallery"
Maureen Paley. Retrieved 14 August 2010. occupying "a chic new industrial space." Paley's base in the area was a precedent for leading galleries such as

White Cube White Cube is a contemporary art gallery founded by Jay Jopling in London in 1993. The gallery has two branches in London: White Cube Mason's Yard in central London and White Cube Bermondsey in South East London; White Cube Hong Kong, in Centra ...

and

Victoria Miro Victoria Marion Miro (born 1 July 1945) is a British art dealer, "one of the grandes dames of the Young British Artists, Britart scene"Husband, Stuart"Go see... the Victoria Miro gallery" ''The Observer'', 3 December 2000. Retrieved 27 September 2 ...

to also locate in the East End." Curated exhibitions In 1994, Paley curated a show at

Camden Arts Centre Camden Art Centre (known as Hampstead Arts Centre until 1967 and Camden Arts Centre until 2020) is a contemporary art gallery in the London Borough of Camden, England. It hosts temporary exhibitions and educational outreach projects, with a prog ...

of work by

Joseph Kosuth Joseph Kosuth (; born January 31, 1945) is a Hungarian-American conceptual artist, who lives in New York and Venice,

Ad Reinhardt Adolph Friedrich Reinhardt (December 24, 1913 – August 30, 1967) was an American abstract painter and art theorist active in New York City for more than three decades. As a theorist he wrote and lectured extensively on art and was a ...

and

Félix González-Torres Félix González-Torres or Felix Gonzalez-Torres (November 26, 1957 – January 9, 1996) was a Cuban-born American Visual arts, visual artist. He lived and worked primarily in New York City between 1979 and 1995 after attending university in P ...

. In 1995, she presented ''Wall to Wall'' featuring wall drawings by artists including

Daniel Buren Daniel Buren (born 25 March 1938, in Boulogne-Billancourt) is a French conceptual artist, painter, and sculptor. He has won numerous awards including the Golden Lion for best pavilion at the Venice Biennale (1986), the International Award for ...

Michael Craig-Martin Sir Michael Craig-Martin (born 28 August 1941) is an Irish-born contemporary conceptual artist and painter. He is known for fostering and adopting the Young British Artists, many of whom he taught, and for his conceptual artwork, '' An Oak ...

Douglas Gordon Douglas Gordon (born 20 September 1966) is a Scottish artist. He won the Turner Prize in 1996, the Premio 2000 at the 47th Venice Biennale in 1997 and the Hugo Boss Prize in 1998. He lives and works in Berlin, Germany. Work Much of Gordon's ...

Barbara Kruger Barbara Kruger (born January 26, 1945) is an American conceptual artist and collagist associated with the Pictures Generation. She is most known for her visual word art that consists of black-and-white photographs, overlaid with declarative ca ...

Sol LeWitt Solomon "Sol" LeWitt (September 9, 1928 – April 8, 2007) was an American artist linked to various movements, including conceptual art and minimalism. LeWitt came to fame in the late 1960s with his wall drawings and "structures" (a term he pref ...

, and

Lawrence Weiner Lawrence Charles Weiner (February 10, 1942December 2, 2021) was an artist born and raised in New York City. One of the central figures in the formation of Conceptual Art in the 1960s, Lawrence Weiner explored the potentials of language as a scu ...

. The National Touring Exhibitions show went to the

Serpentine Gallery The Serpentine Galleries are two contemporary art galleries in Kensington Gardens, Westminster, Greater London. Recently rebranded to just Serpentine, the organisation is split across Serpentine South, previously known as the Serpentine Galler ...

, London,

Southampton City Art Gallery The Southampton City Art Gallery is an art gallery in Southampton, southern England. It is located in the Civic Centre on Commercial Road. The gallery opened in 1939 with much of the initial funding from the gallery coming from two bequests, o ...

, and

Leeds City Art Gallery Leeds Art Gallery in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, is a gallery, part of the Leeds Museums & Galleries group, whose collection of 20th-century British Art was designated by the British government in 1997 as a collection "of national importance ...

. In 1996, for the Henry Moore Sculpture Trust, Paley curated ''The Cauldron'', an exhibition of work by Young British Artists— Christine Borland,

Jake and Dinos Chapman Iakovos "Jake" Chapman (born 1966) and Konstantinos "Dinos" Chapman (born 1962) are British visual artists, previously known as the Chapman Brothers. Their art explores deliberately shocking subject matters; for instance, in 2008, they produc ...

Steven Pippin Steven Pippin (born 1960 at Redhill, Surrey) is an English photographer and installation artist. Pippin works with converted or improvised photographic equipment and kinetic sculptures which are often based on physical models and are metaphors fo ...

, Georgina Starr and Gillian Wearing. It was installed in the Trust's studio space in Dean Clough, Halifax.

2000s

In 2000, Paley staged ''The Agony and the Ecstasy'', the first show of

Rebecca Warren Rebecca Jane Warren (born 1965) is a British visual artist and sculptor,"Rebecca Warren RA"
Royal Aca ...

, who she met after Paley had given a talk at her art school. She said in 2001, "Being a tastemaker—someone who invents the future—requires a delicate balance. You need to be of your time—if you're too far ahead you'll be misunderstood." In 2004, the gallery's name was changed from Interim Art to Maureen Paley. In 2006, when asked why many women have been successful in contemporary art dealing, Paley said,

Art is one of the last unregulated markets. There are no male gatekeepers and you are not confined to traditional alpha-male values. That makes it very attractive to a certain type of woman with a strong personality, who wouldn't fit into a cookie-cutter working environment ..

02 wolfgang-tillmans koeln gal buchholz 120107

Paley was one of the judges of New Sensations, a competition for art students promoted by

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by Channel Four Television Corporation. It is state-owned enterprise, publicly owned but, unlike the BBC, it receives no public funding and is funded en ...

and the

Saatchi Gallery The Saatchi Gallery is a London gallery for contemporary art and an independent charity opened by Charles Saatchi in 1985. Exhibitions which drew upon the collection of Charles Saatchi, starting with US artists and minimalism, moving to the ...

. Jo Craven said in ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was found ...

'' that Paley was one of only five female gallery owners of note in London. In August 2009, reflecting on the legacy of the YBA art scene, Paley said, "The thing that came out of the YBA generation was boldness, a belief that you can do anything." In 2009, Paley was elected to the executive committee of the Society of London Art Dealers.

2010s-

In 2010, Paley was one of a group of art dealers including Sadie Coles who made up the selection committee for the

Frieze Art Fair Frieze Art Fair is an annual contemporary art, contemporary art festival, art fair first held in 2003 in London's Regent's Park. Developed by the founders of the contemporary art magazine ''Frieze (magazine), Frieze'', the fair has since expan ...

. The gallery also takes part in Condo, an exhibition series where host galleries collaborate and share their spaces with visiting galleries. Paley was interviewed for the Art Agency, Partners podcast ''In Other Words'' in 2020 and an episode of ''Talk Art'' in 2022''.'' In 2023, she was invited to deliver the 15th annual Dasha Shenkman Lecture in Contemporary Art at the University of Guelph, Canada.

Artists

Maureen Paley represents numerous living artists, including:

Other activities

Paley supports the programmes of

Artists Space Artists Space is a non-profit art gallery and arts organization first established at 155 Wooster Street in SoHo, Manhattan, New York City. Founded in 1972 by Irving Sandler and Trudie Grace and funded by the New York State Council on the Arts ...

Creative Industries Federation The Creative Industries Federation (2014-2021) was a national organisation for all the UK's creative industries, cultural education and arts. It advocated for the sector, aiming to ensure that the creative industries were central to political, eco ...

, Open School East,

The Showroom The Showroom is a not-for-profit art gallery in Marylebone, London, which displays site-specific works by emerging artists. The gallery presents four shows each year, a schedule that allows artists the time to develop and realise their work on si ...

Studio Voltaire Studio Voltaire is a non-profit gallery and artist studios based in Clapham, South London. The organisation focuses on contemporary arts, staging a public programme of exhibitions, performances, and live events. Studio Voltaire invests in the ...

, and

White Columns White Columns is New York City's oldest alternative non-profit art space. White Columns is known as a showcase for up-and-coming artists, and is primarily devoted to emerging artists who are not affiliated with galleries. All work submitted i ...

. She is also a patron of

Chisenhale Gallery Chisenhale Gallery is a non-profit contemporary art gallery based in London's East End. The gallery occupies the ground level of a former veneer factory on Chisenhale Road, situated in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, near Victoria Park, To ...

, ICA, London, Michael Clark Company,

South London Gallery The South London Gallery, founded 1891, is a public-funded gallery of contemporary art in Camberwell, London. Until 1992, it was known as the South London Art Gallery, and nowadays the acronym SLG is often used. Margot Heller became its direct ...

Tate Tate is an institution that houses, in a network of four art galleries, the United Kingdom's national collection of British art, and international modern and contemporary art. It is not a government institution, but its main sponsor is the UK ...

Artangel Artangel is a London-based arts organisation founded in 1985 by Roger Took. Directed since 1991 by James Lingwood and Michael Morris, it has commissioned and produced a string of notable site-specific works, plus several projects for TV, film, r ...

, the

Whitechapel Gallery The Whitechapel Gallery is a public art gallery in Whitechapel on the north side of Whitechapel High Street, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The original building, designed by Charles Harrison Townsend, opened in 1901 as one of the fi ...

, Charleston, Peer, and

Pallant House Gallery Pallant House Gallery is an art gallery in Chichester, West Sussex, England. It houses one of the best collections of 20th-century British art in the world. History The Gallery's collection is founded on works left to the city of Chichester by ...

, as well as a supporter of the Gallery Climate Coalition (GCC).

Recognition

The ''

'' included Paley in London's 50 most influential people in art and design in 2008 and 2009. In 2009, Paley was placed at 87 (from 70 the previous year) in '' ArtReview's'' art world Power 100 list;
http://www.artreview100.com/people/614/ "87. Maureen Paley"], ''

ArtReview ''ArtReview'' is an international contemporary art magazine based in London, founded in 1948. Its sister publication, ''ArtReview Asia'', was established in 2013. History Launched as a fortnightly broadsheet in February 1949 by a retired country ...

'', 2009. Retrieved 1 August 2021. the citation drew attention to the presence of gallery artists at major events, such as

Rebecca Warren Rebecca Jane Warren (born 1965) is a British visual artist and sculptor,"Rebecca Warren RA"
Royal Aca ...

at the Serpentine Gallery and Wolfgang Tillmans at the

Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale ( ; ) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy. There are two main components of the festival, known as the Art Biennale () and the Venice Biennale of Architecture, Architecture Biennale (), ...

. In 2022, the gallery was listed as one of the '15 best art galleries in London.'

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Paley, Maureen American art dealers American women art dealers Businesspeople from New York City Pembroke College in Brown University alumni Living people 1953 births American expatriates in the United Kingdom Sarah Lawrence College alumni Art dealers from London