statement

Seeing, Memory and Place

I am an artist and a designer. The phenomenology of visual perception is a constant source for my work — in painting and design.

Observing and remembering, these activities help me to physically mark what I perceive: color, light, space, and so on. Memory plays a critical role in making sense of what is seen. The eyes and mind process, question, comprehend, and construct. With the combination of seeing and recalling, the act of creating an image may sometimes achieve a sense of place.

This is what I’m after with each image.

Painting, Surfaces and Sides

For me, painting is also very much about the paint. Often the surfaces of my pieces have texture from the building up of paint strokes, working over areas, and the trails that the brush leaves behind. I always think of Jasper Johns when I paint to remind myself of the physicality of the medium. Sometimes the paint goes onto the sides of the canvas, which in my mind is just fine, it’s part of the process. A painting is exactly what it is — a painting.

Biography

Originally from Long Island, NY, Tim Tait earned a BFA in Drawing from Pratt Institute which allowed him to pursue an interdisciplinary art education including painting, printmaking, sculpture, design, and illustration.

While working as a gallery assistant and preparator for the Bernice Steinbaum Gallery and the Rotunda Gallery in NYC, he met and worked with numerous artists that were influential — Faith Ringgold, Miriam Schapiro, Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, Ed Baynard and others.

Working in his studio in Brooklyn (which he shared with artist An Pham and architect Jim Herr), Tim often mixed the worlds of art, design, and architecture. In 1989 he started to work for artist and architect, Gaetano Pesce, who had a profound influence on his work.

Tim moved his studio to lower Manhattan and worked as an independent artist and designer, collaborating with Faith Ringgold, Gaetano Pesce, Scholastic, and others. He also worked in fashion advertising and print design with designer and photoengraver, Jean Brunel.

In 1999, he moved to Providence, RI where his wife was finishing her degree in painting from the Rhode Island School of Design. He worked as a senior designer with the renowned design firm, Malcolm Grear Designers, a multidisciplinary studio with a history of working with artists, galleries, museums and cultural institutions. Working with Malcolm Grear (and the family of design professionals there) was supremely enlightening for him as both an artist and a designer. Tim went on to become Vice President, and worked there for 22 years.

In 2015 Tim re-established his art studio focusing on painting and works on paper. Currently Tim Tait runs his own design consulting office and teaches an online painting course while working in his home studio in the woods of western Rhode Island.

CV

Group Exhibitions

Land, Sea, Sky
Wickford Art Association Gallery, North Kingstown, RI
May 24–June 23, 2024

Dryden Gallery
Ten works on view/consignment
Dryden Gallery, Providence, RI
February 2024–present

Color & Light
Wickford Art Association Gallery, North Kingstown, RI
February 9–March 10, 2024

Rhode Island Community Invitational
Providence Art Club, Maxwell Mays Gallery, Providence, RI
April 18–May 7, 2021

The American Family Inside Out: A Mixed Media Exhibition of Quilted and Sewn Narrative Works
Curated by Faith Ringgold
Creative Arts Workshop, New Haven, CT
September 19–October 23, 1993

The Toy Show
BACA Downtown (Brooklyn Arts Council), Brooklyn, NY
December, 1989

HOME: A Place, an Idea, a State of Being, a History or a Future; or Homelessness, the Absence of Home
Curated by Faith Ringgold
Goddard-Riverside Community Center, New York, NY
May 8–31, 1987

Art and Architecture
Domus Studio Gallery, New York, NY
March, 1986

Public Art Installations

Flying Home: Harlem Heroes and Heroines, 1996
Collaboration with Faith Ringgold
MTA Art & Design, 125th Street Station, New York, NY

Special Projects

Creating a Sanctuary for Play: A Goethean Place Study Workshop, 2019
Chances Early Childhood Center, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island
Phenomenology workshop by Eva-Maria Simms, Ph.D., Adrian van Kaam Professor of Psychology, Duquesne University, PA

Academics

2023–24, Penn Studio School of Art, online painting instructor

2001–06, Visiting Critic, Portfolio Reviews, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI

1985, BFA, Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, NY

About the Artist