Way back in the 1960s at the exact same moment that Chuck Close was doing it with the faces, Betty Tompkins was making enormous black-and-white photorealist paintings — not of faces — but graphically pornographic images (...), ripped from straight male porn magazines (yes, kids — people used to masturbate to still black-and-white pics back in the day; not color videos like all of you); beautiful paintings of blow jobs, female fingerings, spread-eagle women doing anything you might imagine. I remember seeing images of this work back then and thinking, Wow! I like these way more than Chuck Close; this is someone really going for it in scale, technique, and holding nothing back about image. Sadly and undeservedly — and probably because it was too scary for a woman to be handling in-your-face imagery and scale like this — Tompkins was dealt out of a little history before storming back in about 15 years ago; she's one of the strongest artists out there now, always sparing nothing, using contemporary porn (all-shaved, of course, and bigger dicks, not sure why), in a show that is a must-see for the legions of curators who are always beating the bushes to "rediscover" other "older women artists."
Jerry Salz in Vulture, 23.09.2015
Born 1945 in Washington D.C. USA
Lives and works in New York and Mt. Pleasant, PA USA
Women Words, rodolphe janssen, Brussels, Belgium
Betty Tompkins.Raw Material, MO.CO., Montpellier, France
Some Sex, Lots Of Talking, Gavlak Gallery, Los Angeles, CA USA
TALKING TALKING TALKING, Freehouse, London, UK
GIRL ON GIRL, Helmuts Art Club, Vienna, Austria
FUCK PAINTINGS, ETC, J Hammond Projects, London, UK
Will She Ever Shut Up?, P·P·O·W, New York, NY USA
Betty Tompkins : Women Words, WAAP, Wil Aballe Art Projects, Vancouver, Canada
rodolphe janssen, Brussels, Belgium
Betty Tompkins & Jean-Baptiste Bernadet, Ribordy Contemporary, Geneva, Switzerland
Betty Tompkins, Kunstraum Innsbruck, Innsbruck, Austria
small, Marlborough Gallery, Viewing room, New York, NY USA
Virgins, P·P·O·W, New York, NY USA
Jean Baptiste Bernadet & Betty Tompkins, Hasley Mckay Gallery, East Hampton, NY USA
Sex Works / WOMEN Words: Words, Phrases and Stories, Gavlak Gallery, Palm Beach, FL USA
Sex Works / WOMEN Words: Words, Phrases and Stories, Gavlak Gallery, Los Angeles, CA USA
WOMEN Words Phrases and Stories, The FLAG Art Foundation, New York, NY USA
Real Ersatz, FUG, New York City, NY USA
Art Basel Feature, Galerie Rodolphe Janssen, Basel, Switzerland
Paintings & Works On Paper 1972-2013, Sarah Gavlak Gallery, Palm Beach, FL USA
Woman Words, Dinter Fine Art, project room #63, New York, NY USA
Home alone 2, Betty Tompkins and Dadamaino, New York, NY USA
Galerie Rodolphe Janssen, Brussels, Belgium
Sex Works, Galerie Andrea Caratsch, Zurich, Switzerland
New Work, Mitchell Algus Gallery, New York, NY USA
Sex Works, Mitchell Algus Gallery, New York, NY USA
Lawrimore project, Seattle, WA USA
Fuck Paintings and Drawings, Galerie Andrea Caratsch, Zurich, Switzerland
New Paintings and Drawings, Mitchell Algus Gallery, New York, NY USA
Fuck Paintings 1969-74, Mitchell Algus Gallery, New York, NY USA
Egizio’s Project, New York, NY USA
Femme Fatale: Gaze-Power-Gender, Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg, Germany
Floating Truth, Gana Art, Seoul, South Korea
A Maze Zanine, Amaze Zaning, A-Mezzaning, Meza-9, curated by Ei Arakawa, Kerstin Brätsch, Nicole Eisenman, and Laura Owens, Performance Space New York at David Zwirner, New York, NY USA
Sensitive Content, Unit London, London, UK USA
A Woman’s Right to Pleasure, BlackBook Presents at Sotheby’s, Los Angeles, CA USA
A Feminist Avant Garde from the Verbund Collection, Museum of Contemporary Art Vojvodina, Novi Sad, Serbia
Les Rencontres de la Photographie d’Arles, Arles, France
Drawers: Provocative Drawings, curated by Laura Hutson Hunter, OZ Arts, Nashville, TN USA
Late Night Enterprise, Perrotin, New York, NY USA
Female Sensibility. Feminist Avant-Garde from the SAMMLUNG VERBUND, Lentos Kunstmuseum Linz, Austria
Works on paper, rodolphe janssen, Brussels, Belgium
To Cast Too Bold A Shadow, Shelley & Donald Rubin Foundation, New York, NY USA
IMAGE POWER, Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem, The Netherlands
Reflections, Gana Art Gallery, Seoul Korea, Seoul, South Korea
FEMINISMS!, The Feminist Avant-Garde of the 1970s. Works from the VERBUND COLLECTION, CCCB, Barcelona, Spain
Modification, Petzel Gallery, New York, NY USA
Tainted Love, Villa Arson, Nice, France
Fuck Your Fear, Van Horn Gallery, Düsseldorf, Germany
Afflatus, 5-50 Gallery, curated by Amy Hill and Suzanne Unrein, Queens, NY USA
Strategic Vandalism: The Legacy of Asger Jorn’s Modification Paintings, Petzel Gallery, New York, NY USA
Rise, RIBORDY THETAZ, Geneva, Switzerland
A Woman Looking at Men Looking at Women, curated by Kasia Redzisz, Muzeum Susch, Zernez, Switzerland
Under/erasure, Pierogi, New York, NY USA
The Value of Freedom, Belvedere Museum Vienna, Austria
WOMEN NOW, Austrian Cultural Forum, New York, NY USA
WOMAN, The Feminist Avant-Garde of the 1970s, Works from the SAMMLUNG VERBUND Collection, Vienna, Stavanger Art Museum, Norway
Declaration, Institute for Contemporary Art (ICA), Richmond, VA, USA
IN THE CUT: The Male Body in Feminist Art, Stadtgalerie Saarbrücken, Saarbrücken, Germany
Tainted Love, Comfrot Moderne, Poitiers, France
Theft is Vision, LUMA Westbau, Zurich, Switzerland
Histories of sexuality, curated by Camilia Bechelany, MASP, Sao Paolo, Brazil
Nude, V1 Gallery, Copenhagen, Denmark
Für Barbara, The Hall Art Foundation | Schloss Derneburg Museum, Derneburg, Germany
CUNT, Venus LA, Los Angeles, CA USA
SECRET GARDEN, The Female Gaze on Erotica, Untitiled Space, New York, NY USA
Ear Putty, 56 HENRY (annex), New York, NY USA
Flaming June VII (Flaming Creatures), Gavlak LA, Los Angeles, CA USA
Uniques en leurs genres, Galerie Christophe Gaillard, Paris, France
Dicks, Fortnight Institute, New York, NY USA
Betty Tompkins and Bill Mutter, Plato's Cave at EIDIA House, Brooklyn, NY USA
Amy Greenan - Eric Magnuson - Brad Phillips - Betty Tompkins, Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center, Buffalo, NY USA
Das Loch, Künstlerhaus Bremen, Bremen, Germany
Summer Reading, Fortnight Institute, New York, NY USA
X, Lyles & King Gallery, New York, NY USA
The Female Gaze Part 2, Cheim & Read, New York, NY USA
Landscapes, Marlborough Gallery, New York, NY USA
Black Sheep Feminism, Dallas Contemporary, Dallas, TX USA
A Sight For Sore Eyes, Artsy at Art Brussels, Brussels, Belgium (with Lucas Jardin)
Word by Word, Luxembourg & Dayan, London, UK curated by Francesco Bonami
Viewer Discretion…Children of Bataille, Stux Haller Gallery, New York, NY USA. curated by Kathleen Cullen
Venganza (I don’t want to be friends), organized by Gea Polity, Milan, Italy
Lust, HVCCA, Peeksil, New York, NY USA
Fertility, presented by Jane Kim, 33 Orchard, New York, NY USA
The Shell (Landscapes, Portaits & Shapes) a show by Eric Troncy, Almine Rech Gallery, Paris, France
Eureka! curated by Kendell Geers, Galerist, New York, NY USA
Rear Window Treatment, Louis B. James, New York, NY USA
A Drawing Show, Matthew Marks Gallery, New York, NY USA
CORPUS, Zacheta National Gallery, Warsaw, Poland
A Chromatic Loss, curated by Jeffrey Uslip, Bortolami, New York, NY USA
Selections from the Sarah and Matchelle Vance Waddel Collection, Art Academy of Cincinatti, Cincinatti, OH USA
Aftershock: The Impact of Radical Art, Edelman Arts, New York, NY USA
Independents, V1 Gallery, Copenhagen, Denmark
Sunsets and Pussy, Marianne Boesky Gallery, Nex York, NY USA
Skin Trade, an in-depth look at the surface of things, P.P.O.W Gallery, New York, NY USA
Jew York, Unt/tled & Zach Feuer, New York, NY USA
DSM-V, curated by David Rimaneli, presented by Vito Schnabel, Farley Post Office, New York, NY, USA
A few of my favorite things, CB ! Gallery, Los Angeles, CA USA
Temporary Autonomous Zone / 2 Erogenous Zone, Galerie im Körnerpark & Pony Royal, Berlin, Germany
The Origin of the World/The Force of the Source/The Cause of the Vigor, Samsøn, Boston, MA USA
Betty Tompkins and Dadamaino, Home Alone 2 Gallery, New York, NY USA
Sex, Money and Power, Maison Particulière, Brussels, Belgium
Dark Garnaal, Galerie Rodolphe Janssen, Summer Project, Villa Knokke, Knokke Heist, Belgium
Newtopia, Special guest of Kendell Geers, Kazerne Dossin Memorial, Mechelen, Belgium
In the Pink, Joe Sheftel Gallery, New York, NY USA
Screw you, Susan Inglett Gallery, New York, NY USA
Character Analysis, Joe Sheftel Gallery, New York, NY USA
Grisaille, Luxembourg & Dayan, New York, NY USA
Narrative to the Perverse II, Jancar Gallery, Los Angeles, CA USA
Invitation to the Voyage – Charles Baudelaire, Algus Greenspon, New York, NY USA
No government No cry, a project by Kendell Geers, CIAP Actuele Kunst, Hasselt, Belgium
Lust and Vice : The Seven Deadly Sins From Durer to Naumann, Kunstmuseum Bern and Zentrum Paul Klee, Bern, Switzerland
Visible Vagina, Francis Naumann Gallery, New York, NY USA
Consider The Oyster, James graham & Sons, New York, NY USA
elles@centrepompidou, Centre Pompidou, Musée d’art moderne, Paris, France
Naked! Size Matters, Paul Kasmin Gallery, New York, NY USA
Revolver, COCO, Vienna, Austria
The Line Is A Lonely Hunter - Drawings In New Jersey, New Jersey, Basel, Switzerland
Images, Head, Geneva, Switerland
How To Cook A Wolf: Part 1, Dinter Fine Art, New York, NY USA
www.Women, Headbones Gallery, Toronto, Canada
Into Position, Baurnmarkt, Vienna, Austria
Le Plaisir au Dessin, Musee de Beaux Arts, Lyon, France
Handsome Young Doctor, Cubitt Gallery, London, UK
Exquisite Corpse-Cadavre Exquis, Mitchell Algus Gallery, New York, NY USA
Uncertain States of America, Serpentine Gallery, London, UK and traveling
La Beauté de l’Enfer, Galerie Rodolphe Janssen, Brussels, Belgium
[Untitled/Nudes], Printed Matter, New York, NY USA
Nouvelles Acquisitions, Oeuvres Contemporaines, Centre Pompidou, Musée National D’Art Moderne, Paris, France
It Happened Tomorrow, Biennale de Lyon, Lyon France
Weir Farm Trust/National Park Service Wilton CT USA
Director’s Award, Warren Tanner Memorial Fund
Project Development Grant, New School, New York, NY USA
Yaddo, Saratoga Springs, NY Macdowell Colony (also 82, 83, 88) Peterborough, NH
New York Foundation for the Arts
CAPS Grant
Ossabaw Island Project, Savannah, GA
Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minneapolis, MN USA
Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia PA USA
Brooklyn Museum, New York, NY USA
Allen Art Museum, Oberlin, OH USA
Centre Pompidou, Musee National d’Art Moderne, Paris, France
Islip Art Museum, East Islip, NY USA
Museum Of The City Of New York, NY USA
Stamford Museum, Stamford, CT USA
Zimmereli Art Museum, New Brunswick, NJ USA