Tara Donovan

Tara Donovan (b. 1969, New York) is an American artist.

Donovan's work uses everyday manufactured materials such as Scotch tape, Styrofoam cups, and drinking straws to create large scale sculptures that often have a biomorphic quality. Her sculptures must be assembled and disassembled carefully, which sometimes involve an extremely tedious process.

Her studies began at the School of Visual Arts, New York in 1987-88. Donovan received her BFA at the Corcoran College of Art and Design, Washington, D.C. in 1991, and earned her MFA at Virginia Commonwealth University in 1999.

Her work was featured in the Whitney Biennial in 2000 and the All Soviet Exhibition. She was the recipient of the Alexander Calder Foundation's first annual Calder Prize in 2005. In 2006 her work was featured in two solo exhibitions at PaceWildenstein in New York, the gallery that has represented her since 2005. Donovan installed Untitled (Mylar) in November 2007 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, made of silver Mylar tape. She was the fourth artist selected by the museum for an ongoing series featuring contemporary artists, preceded by Tony Oursler, Kara Walker, and Neo Rauch. Donovan was a 2008 MacArthur Fellow.

Donovan says of her work, "It is not like I'm trying to simulate nature. It's more of a mimicking of the way of nature, the way things actually grow."

Tara Donovan lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.