Hany Armanious

Hany Armanious (born 1962) is an Egyptian born, Australian artist who lives and works in Sydney. Armanious produces installations and sculptural forms, as well as paintings and drawings.

Life and work
Hany Armanious was born in Ismailia, Egypt and migrated to Australia with his family at the age of 6. He completed his schooling in Australia and holds a Bachelor of Arts (Visual Arts) degree from the City Art Institute, Sydney and a doctorate in Creative Arts from the University of Wollongong. ) Since 2019 he has been Head of Sculpture at the National Art School in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. In the early nineties Armanious considered a ‘key figure’ in a number of artists who critics noted as being influenced by the grunge movement. Although born in Egypt and conscious of its cultural ties Armanious’s work does not specifically reference that culture. He has been described as an artist who can 're-describe objects' using ‘poor materials’. As his practice has developed Armanious has achieved this goal through making moulds of ordinary objects and replicating them as parts of completed works. As Armonious has himself said, ‘…my interest in casting partly grew from a technique in my painting that utilized contact prints. Casting is like three-dimensional printmaking.“

Exhibitions
Armanious has shown with a number of dealer galleries and currently exhibits with Michael Lett in Auckland, Fine Arts, Sydney and Southard Reid in London. He has also shown with Foxy Production in New York, Sarah Cottier Gallery and Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery in Sydney, Galleria Raucci/Santamaria, Naples and the Galerie Allen in Paris.

Selected exhibitions in public art institutions:

1990


 * The Readymade Boomerang; Certain Relations in 20th-century Art (group) 8th Biennale of Sydney. Artistic Director René Block focussed on Duchamp and the power of the readymade on 20th century art.

1991


 * Perspecta (group) Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney. Curated by Victoria Lynn

1992


 * The Boundary Rider 9th Biennale of Sydney (group). Artistic Director: Anthony Bond.

1993


 * Wit’s end  Museum of Contemporary Art Sydney. (group) Curated by Kay Campbell.
 * Aperto ’93 at the 45th Venice Biennale (group). Directed by Achille Bonito Oliva.
 * Plastic Fantastic (group) Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney

1994


 * Aussemblage (group) Auckland City Gallery, New Zealand.

1995


 * Johannesburg Biennale (group) South Africa.

1998


 * Möet and Chandon Touring Art (group) Prize National Gallery of Australia, Canberra touring all state galleries. Armanious was the 1998 Fellow. Armanious was also included in the 2000 edition of the Möet et Chandon Fellows Exhibition at Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney.

2001


 * Hammer Projects: Hany Armanious Hammer Museum Los Angeles.

2002


 * Fieldwork: Australian Art 1968 – 2002 (group) National Gallery of Victoria, Federation Square, Melbourne.

2003


 * Bloom mutation, toxicity and the sublime. (group) Govett Brewster Art Gallery, New Plymouth, New Zealand.

2005


 * National Sculpture Prize (group) National Gallery of Australia, Canberra.

2005


 * Hany Armanious: Artists Project Auckland Art Gallery.

2006


 * Before the Body-Matter (group) Monash University Museum of Art, Melbourne
 * Uncanny Nature Australia Centre of Contemporary Art, Melbourne, curated by Rebecca Coates.
 * Busan Biennale (group) Korea.

2007


 * Hany Armanious: Morphic Resonance City Gallery, Wellington and Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane 2007. The exhibition title comes from biologist Rupert Sheldrake’s theory around the ‘unseen interconnectedness of things’.

2008


 * Hany Armanious Contemporary Art Museum ST Louis, United States of America.
 * Ceramica (group) Institute of Contemporary Art, Sydney

2010


 * Before and After Science Adelaide Biennale (group) curated by Charlotte Day and Sarah Tutton, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide.

2011


 * The Golden Thread (2011) at The fifty- fourth Venice Biennale. Armanious was the Australian representative at the 54th Biennale his work examining, ‘the relationship between the readymade and figurative sculptural traditions’.

2012


 * Mutatis Mutandis (group) Secession, Vienna.

2013


 * Hany Armanious’s Fountain Museum of Contemporary Art Sydney. Armanious’s installation was the Inaugural Museum of Contemporary Art Sculpture the first in a series of commissions on the MCA’s new Loti Smorgon Sculpture Terrace. The sculpture was based on an anatomical model of the inner ear.

2017


 * Future Eaters (group) MUMA (Monash University Museum of Art ), Melbourne.

2024


 * Hany Amanious Stone Soup Henry Moore Foundation.

Note
For a full list of Hany Armanious exhibitions go here

Collections

 * Art Gallery of New South Wales
 * Chartwell Collection
 * Heide
 * National Gallery of Australia
 * MCA
 * Queensland Art Gallery
 * National Gallery of Victoria
 * Monash University Gallery
 * Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego
 * Auckland City Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki

Awards
1998 Moët et Chandon fellowship

2004 Artist in residence, Elam School of Fine Arts International Arts Residency Programme, Auckland.