Tanja Nis-Hansen

Tanja Nis-Hansen (born in 1988, Denmark) lives and works in Berlin. She studied in Copenhagen and Vienna before achieving both her BFA (2016) and MFA (2018) at the Academy of Fine Arts, Hamburg under the supervision of professor Jutta Koether.

Working between the mediums of painting, text, and performance, takes as her subject the body’s presence amid contemporary capitalism - anxious, waiting, resting, ill or non-functioning. Her semi-autobiographical works, which explore motifs including waiting rooms, spiral staircases, moments of rest, and text statements, invite the viewer to think about female labor, exhaustion, illness, bodily maintenance, heritage, and the environment. Perceptible throughout Nis-Hansen’s stylistically diverse oeuvre is an abiding curiosity about the history of painting and the social construction of hierarchies of taste. The artist evinces a fascination for theater and stage design, which in her paintings surfaces not only through the inner logic of space on the canvas, but also through an all over “theatrical” mode of representation.

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Tanja Nis-Hansen has had solo exhibitions at Galerie im Turm, Berlin (with Yen Chun Lin) (2024); Solito - Galleria S2 (2023); palace enterprise, Copenhagen (2023); Vestjyllands Kunstpavillon, Videbæk (2022); Sans titre, Paris (2022 and 2019); Udstillingsstedet Sydhavn Station, Copenhagen (2019); HfBK, Hamburg (2018); Come Over chez Malik’s, Hamburg (2017).

Her work has been shown in group exhibitions at ICAT – HFBK Hamburg (2024); OTP Copenhagen (2024); Harkawik, New York (2024); Condo at Union Pacific, London (2024); Mécènes du Sud, Montpellier (2023); Belenius, Stockholm (2023); Rundetårn, Copenhagen (2022); Sans titre, Paris (2022 & 2019); June, Berlin (2022); L’INCONNUE, New York (2021); SORT, Vienna (2019); Crum Heaven, Stockholm (2019); Sans titre, Paris (2019); AEDT, Düsseldorf (2019); Rumpelstiltskin, New York (2018); Kunsthaus Hamburg (2018); Galleria Federico Vavassori, Milan (2018); Munchener Kammerspiele, Munich (2018); Der Tank, Institut Kunst HGK FHNW, Basel (2018); Halle für Kunst Lüneburg (2017); Galerie der HfBK, Hamburg (2016); Godsbanen, Aarhus (2015) and Parallel Vienna, Vienna (2014).

The artist was awarded the Neue Kunst Hamburg grant with Niclas Riepshoff (with whom she forms the duo CONNY) and a grant by the Danish Art Council in 2019, after being nominated for the Hamburger Arbeitsstipendium, the Hiscox Kunstpreis and the Schues Nachwuchsförderung all in 2018.

Tanja Nis-Hansen’s works are featured in the permanent collection of the Danish Arts Foundation and the New Carlsberg Foundation.

exhibition view, Dort, wo das Nichts ist, 2023, Galerie im Turm, Berlin

The biggest mystery in the universe II, 2023, putty, pumice, oil pastel, acrylic and oil on canvas with wooden frame, ⌀ 416 cm

exhibition view, Freaky Weather, 2023, Solito - Galleria S2, Naples

exhibition view, Nos corps anarchiques, 2023, curated by Georgia René-Worms, Mécènes du Sud, Montpellier

exhibition view, impatient girl, 2023, palace enterprise, Copenhagen

Dr. Giggles and The Dramatics, 2023, oil and oil pastel on canvas, pine wood frame, 162.5 x 122.5 cm, unique

Little-Miss-Fortune-Telling, I, II, III, 2023, oil, acrylic and oil chalk on canvas with pine wood frame, 270 x 70 cm, unique

exhibition view, impatient girl, 2023, palace enterprise, Copenhagen

Flowers For The Continuous Katherine Mortenhoe, 2022, oil and acrylic on canvas, 160 x 120 cm, unique

From Mourning ’Til Evening (Summer), 2022, oil and acrylic on canvas, 220 x 180 cm, unique

exhibition view, Employee of the Month, 2022, Vestjyllands Kunstpavillon, Videbæk

Deoxyribonucleic Acid Trip 3, 2022, oil and acrylic on canvas, 220 x 180 cm, unique, exhibition view, Kassandras søstre, 2022, Rundetårn, Copenhagen

exhibition view, The Great Spaghettification, 2022, Sans titre (2016), Paris

Deoxyribonucleic Acid Trip 2, 2021, oil and acrylic on canvas, wooden frame, 220 x 180 cm, unique

exhibition view, The Great Spaghettification, 2022, Sans titre (2016), Paris

Green face (I am still a patient girl), 2021, graphite putty and oil on canvas, wooden frame, ø 20 cm, unique

exhibition view, The Great Spaghettification, 2022, Sans titre (2016), Paris

Are you ready to get healthy?, 2021, oil and acrylic on canvas, wooden frame, 90 x 70 cm, unique

Let me tickle your fears (detail), 2021, installation with 340 CNC cut MDF letters, 15 x 1.2 cm (each), unique

exhibition view, The Great Spaghettification, 2022, Sans titre (2016), Paris

Rusty clock (I am still a patient girl), 2021, iron compound, oxidation compound, MDF, metal and clockwork, wooden frame, ø 50 cm, unique

CONNY (Tanja Nis-Hansen & Niclas Riepshoff), Find me in the Filling, 2021, exhibition view, Neue Kunst in Hamburg at Galerie Melike Bilir

CONNY (Tanja Nis-Hansen & Niclas Riepshoff), Find me in the Filling (video still), 2021, video, 17:09 min

CONNY (Tanja Nis-Hansen & Niclas Riepshoff), exhibition view, 20:15 Uhr, 2021, Neue Kunst in Hamburg at Galerie Melike Bilir

CONNY (Tanja Nis-Hansen & Niclas Riepshoff), 4:00, 2021, ink, paper, magazine cut-out, collage on paper, 28.5 x 40 cm, unique

CONNY (Tanja Nis-Hansen & Niclas Riepshoff), exhibition view, 20:15 Uhr, 2021, Neue Kunst in Hamburg at Galerie Melike Bilir

CONNY (Tanja Nis-Hansen & Niclas Riepshoff), 18:10, 2021, ink, collage on paper, 26 x 38.5 cm, unique

installation view, solo presentation at LISTE Art Fair, 2021, Basel

Notes on death due to falling, 2021, oil on canvas, 160 x 240 cm, unique

Start singing lessons, get a dog, work out, enjoy your evolving career, 2021, oil on canvas, 90 x 70 cm, unique

installation view, solo presentation at LISTE Art Fair, 2021, Basel

The dramatics, 2021, oil on canvas, 50 x 40 cm, unique

Abracadabra, Now you see it, now you don’t, 2021, graphite putty, iron primer and oxidation medium on canvas, 50 x 40 cm, unique

exhibition view, Ancient Tongues, 2021, L’INCONNUE, New York

I’m a patient girl, 2020, oil and acrylic on canvas, ø 90 cm, unique

Self-Portrait as the Allegory of Painting, 2020, oil and acrylic on canvas, 120 x 100 cm, unique

Death Watch or 45 minutes of solitude but now it’s a quarter to 2, 2020, oil and acrylic on canvas, ø 120 cm, unique

The lady is seemingly floating, 2020, oil and acrylic on canvas, 80 x 70 cm, unique

exhibition view, The Benign Tumour, 2019, Sans titre (2016), Paris

Cat and fox deliberating on possible escape routes (or every night we practice how to die), 2019, oil on canvas, 60 x 80 cm, unique

exhibition view, The Benign Tumour, 2019, Sans titre (2016), Paris

Keep your eyes peeled, all of our histories are just stories, 2019, oil and graphite putty on canvas, 140 x 110 cm, unique

exhibition view, The Benign Tumour, 2019, Sans titre (2016), Paris

Internal affairs, 2018, oil and graphite on canvas, 80 x 60 cm, unique

When the inevitable collapse came to town, 2019, acrylic, graphite putty and oil on canvas, 80 x 60 cm, unique

exhibition view, DE HIMLENDE ØJNE, 2019, Udstillingsstedet Sydhavn Station, Copenhagen

Away from Keyboard - Out of Oxygen, 2019, oil on canvas, 180 x 360 cm, unique

performance view, Teenage Mutant, 2019, Udstillingsstedet Sydhavn Station, Copenhagen

exhibition view, DE HIMLENDE ØJNE, 2019, Udstillingsstedet Sydhavn Station, Copenhagen

Thunderbolt and lightning, very very frightening, 2019, oil on canvas, ø 80 cm, unique

performance view, Teenage Mutant, 2019, Kunsthaus Hamburg

CONNY (Tanja Nis-Hansen & Niclas Riepshoff), Set up for CONNY (Membrane), 2018-2019, oil and pigment on canvas on wooden frame, chain, styrofoam, newspapers, mirrors, 300 x 200 cm, unique