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Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman in his studio, 2025

Tom Friedman in his studio, 2025

Photo by Axel Dupeux

Tom Friedman is best known for his highly conceptual work that transmutes ordinary objects through meticulous processes. Over the course of his decades-long career, his oeuvre has explored materials and the object, photography and drawing, video exhibitions, and public sculptural installations, continuously pushing his work into new terrains. Oscillating between maximalism and minimalism, his aesthetics recall those of Pop Art while deeply engaging with the history of sculpture.

In Detritus, Friedman’s solo exhibition at Lehmann Maupin in New York, the artist makes his most drastic leap yet—into the world of traditional painting on canvas. The compositions on view depict still lives made from garbage scraps, fragments of previous sculptures, or discarded packaging, all sourced from Friedman’s own life and made anew through art-making. In this way, Friedman continues to explore cycles of entropy, erosion, recycling, and renewal.

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Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Tom Friedman: Detritus at Lehmann Maupin, New York, 2025

Friedman often plays with the logic of scale in his work; previous art objects range from monumental, to miniscule, to entirely absent or conceptual.

Detritus is a playful, meticulous reimagining of the ordinary, marking a striking evolution in Friedman’s ever-inventive practice. Read on to learn more about the artist’s expansive and longstanding career, from his early adventures in material to his monumental public sculptures.

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Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Detritus, 2025

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TOM FRIEDMAN

Detritus, 2025

Acrylic paint on canvas

30 x 40 inches

76.2 x 101.6 cm

© Tom Friedman

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Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Self Portrait, 2025

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TOM FRIEDMAN

Self Portrait, 2025

Acrylic paint on canvas

50 x 40 inches

127 x 101.6 cm

© Tom Friedman

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“Friedman’s work renders everyday detritus—toothpaste, spaghetti, eraser shavings, plastic drinking straws—extraordinary, even unrecognizable. His art evinces painstaking construction and fastidious precision. Friedman’s treatment, beyond transforming common objects into art objects, yields profound uncanniness.”

— Natasha Degen, Frieze, June 2008

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Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Yarn/Brain, 2025

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TOM FRIEDMAN

Yarn/Brain, 2025

Acrylic paint on canvas

40 x 40 inches

101.6 x 101.6 cm

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Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Consumer Roadkill, 2025

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TOM FRIEDMAN

Consumer Roadkill, 2025

Acrylic on canvas

36 x 45 inches
91.4 x 114.3 cm

© Tom Friedman

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EDUCATION AND EARLY CAREER | 1980s–1990s

Born in 1965 in St. Louis, Missouri, Tom Friedmen received his BFA in illustration from Washington University in St. Louis before completing his MFA at the University of Illinois at Chicago in 1990.

Friedman’s early work is characterized by his juxtaposition of everyday materials and meticulous craftmanship. His well-known piece Untitled (soap) (1990) exemplifies this playful tension, where Friedman inlaid a perfectly formed spiral of his own body hair into a bar of soap. The work’s immaculate form and “clean” lines nod to the aesthetics of minimalist sculpture while defying its tendency towards larger works, making Friedman a sort of “infinitismal minimalist.”¹

More overtly conceptual works, such as Untitled (A Curse) (1992), interrogate the very nature of art. To create this work, the artist hired a professional witch to curse the space above a pedestal. By probing the unspoken contract between artist and viewer, the work challenges what can—and cannot—be considered art.

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Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman with his mother, Lois Friedman, in the artist’s graduate school studio

University of Illinois at Chicago, 1989

Tom Friedman with his mother, Lois Friedman, in the artist’s graduate school studio

University of Illinois at Chicago, 1989

Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 1990

Hair, soap

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 1990

Hair, soap

4" x 2" x 1"

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Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Bee, 2025

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TOM FRIEDMAN

Bee, 2025

Acrylic on canvas

48 x 48 inches
121.9 x 121.9 cm

© Tom Friedman

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Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

My Old Shoe, 2025

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TOM FRIEDMAN

My Old Shoe, 2025

Acrylic paint on canvas

40 x 40 inches
101.6 x 101.6 cm

© Tom Friedman

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Tom Friedman Timeline

MUSEUM EXHIBITIONS | 1990s to the Present

In 1995, Friedman’s work was exhibited in a solo presentation at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, which debuted as part of the museum’s “Projects 50” series dedicated to emerging artists.

The year 2000 marked a major milestone in Friedman’s career: he was named a finalist for the Guggenheim Museum’s prestigious Hugo Boss Prize and saw the debut of Tom Friedman: The Epic in the Everyday, the first institutional survey exhibition of his work. That exhibition toured nationally, including to the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago and the New Museum in New York.

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Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: The Epic in the Everyday at the New Museum, New York, 2000

Tom Friedman: The Epic in the Everyday at the New Museum, New York, 2000

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: The Epic in the Everyday at the New Museum, New York, 2000

Tom Friedman: The Epic in the Everyday at the New Museum, New York, 2000

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: Stitching at Fondazione Prada, Milan, Italy, 2002

Tom Friedman: Stitching at Fondazione Prada, Milan, Italy, 2002

In her review of the survey at the New Museum, critic Roberta Smith lauded Friedman’s deft ability to synthesize postwar styles with a “Fluxus feel for the overlooked and the uncanny and a Pop love of things found around the house.”² Smith would later write in 2014: “The artist Tom Friedman tends to blow our minds and then move on, rarely repeating himself.”³

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Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman at the South London Gallery, 2004

Tom Friedman at the South London Gallery, 2004

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman at the South London Gallery, 2004

Tom Friedman at the South London Gallery, 2004

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman at the South London Gallery, 2004

Tom Friedman at the South London Gallery, 2004

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: Up in the Air at Magasin III Museum for Contemporary Art, Stockholm, 2010

Tom Friedman: Up in the Air at Magasin III Museum for Contemporary Art, Stockholm, 2010

Tom Friedman Timeline

Tom Friedman: Aluminium Foil at Lever House Art Collection, New York, 2007

Tom Friedman: Aluminium Foil at Lever House Art Collection, New York, 2007

WORKS IN MUSEUM COLLECTIONS

Friedman’s work is included in the permanent collections of major museums around the world, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, the Magasin III Museum for Contemporary Art in Sweden, and the Lisser Art Museum (LAM) in the Netherlands, among others.

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Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled [Dollar Bill, Back], 2011

Screenprint

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled [Dollar Bill, Back], 2011

Screenprint

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York

Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 1995

Plastic, hair, fuzz, Play-doh, wire, paint, and wood

The Museum of Modern Art, New York

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 1995

Plastic, hair, fuzz, Play-doh, wire, paint, and wood

The Museum of Modern Art, New York

Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Care Package (Manipulated), 2008

Ink jet photos

The Broad, Los Angeles

TOM FRIEDMAN

Care Package (Manipulated), 2008

Ink jet photos

The Broad, Los Angeles

Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 1996

Chromogenic print

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 1996

Chromogenic print

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 1998

Chromogenic print

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 1998

Chromogenic print

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 2001

Chicken wire and painted Styrofoam balls

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 2001

Chicken wire and painted Styrofoam balls

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York

Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled (A Curse), 1992

Witch’s curse and pedestal

The Warehouse, Dallas

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled (A Curse), 1992

Witch’s curse and pedestal

The Warehouse, Dallas

Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled (Styrofoam cups—Grey scale), 2002

Acrylic on cups

Denver Art Museum

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled (Styrofoam cups—Grey scale), 2002

Acrylic on cups

Denver Art Museum

Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 1993

RC-print

Fotomuseum Winterthur

TOM FRIEDMAN

Untitled, 1993

RC-print

Fotomuseum Winterthur

Huddle Dallas Cowboys Banner

OUTDOOR PUBLIC SCULPTURE | 2010s to the Present

Throughout his career, Friedman has developed an important body of outdoor and public sculptures. These immersive works embody the whimsical yet intentional nature of his practice on a monumental scale.

In his celebrated large-scale sculpture Looking Up, an elongated, silver figure looks to the sky, inviting viewers to stand at its base and do the same. Looking Up was installed at the entrance of Rockefeller Center’s Channel Gardens in January 2021, and has been exhibited at Park Avenue, New York; South Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Illinois; and the Contemporary Austin, Texas, among others.

IN THE STUDIO WITH TOM FRIEDMAN | 2025

In the following video, Friedman invites viewers inside his studio as he prepares for Detritus. Watch to see Friedman reflect on his love for garbage, the role of an artist, and the process of creating this new body of work.

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In the Studio with Tom Friedman

Film by Pushpin Films

Produced by Lehmann Maupin

In the Studio with Tom Friedman

Film by Pushpin Films

Produced by Lehmann Maupin

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Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

AHH, 2025

TOM FRIEDMAN

AHH, 2025

Acrylic on canvas

24 x 18 x 3/4 inches

61 x 45.7 x 1.9 cm

© Tom Friedman

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Tom Friedman Timeline

TOM FRIEDMAN

Plastic Man, 2025

TOM FRIEDMAN

Plastic Man, 2025

Acrylic on canvas

24 x 20 x 3/4 inches

61 x 50.8 x 1.9 cm

© Tom Friedman

From his early, meticulously crafted explorations of material to his large-scale, immersive installations, Tom Friedman’s practice playfully probes the boundaries of perception, value, and meaning. Now, putting paint to canvas for the first time, the artist recontextualizes the detritus around us, uncovering a sense of renewal amidst the mundane.

Visit Detritus to experience Tom Friedman’s big ideas unfold through meticulous details.

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GET IN TOUCH

¹ John Waters and Tom Friedman, “Serious Playboys: Tom Friedman in Conversation With John Waters,” Parkett, 2002. Link

² Roberta Smith, “Art Review; Magic Transforms Ordinary Materials Into Extraordinary Works,” The New York Times, October 26, 2001. Link

³ Roberta Smith, “Tom Friedman: ‘Paint and Styrofoam,’” The New York Times, July 31, 2014. Link

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