Adam Pendleton was born in Richmond, Virginia (US) in 1984. He lives and works in New York (US).

Adam Pendleton, a central figure in contemporary abstract painting, is known for works that push the boundaries of the medium through a sustained engagement with process, language, and form. He extends non-linear compositional traditions that are rooted in twentieth- and twenty-first-century painting. His work, a distilled layering of gesture and fragment, is marked by a precision reminiscent of Conceptual and Minimal art. In 2008, he began to define the working method for which he is now widely recognized as Black Dada – a critical framework that explores the relationship between Blackness, abstraction, and the historical avant-gardes. 

Pendleton’s painting process begins on paper, where he explores the full breadth of mark-making. He layers paint, spray paint, ink, and watercolor, integrating fragmentary text and geometric forms, often through stenciling techniques. These works on paper are photographed and then layered using a screen-printing process that deliberately moves between, and generatively conflates, manual and mechanical procedures, rethinking how paintings are constructed through stages of translation and transformation. Blurring distinctions between painting, drawing, and photography, the resulting works are a tangible manifestation of Pendleton’s belief in painting as a powerful “visual and conceptual force.”