In his fifty-plus years as an artist, Gary Sweeney has established a body of artwork that is “as diverse in its media and presentation as it is singular in its wit and intelligence.”

Sweeney was born into the fertile artistic climate of 1950s Southern California, and both his father and grandmother were artists. He graduated in 1975 with a degree in Fine Arts from UC Irvine, which was then a hotbed of Conceptualism and Post-minimalism. To support his art making, which includes photography, painting and sculpting - resulting in a body of work ranging from neon signs, billboards and murals to rug making, book art, and video - Sweeney took a job as a baggage handler for Continental Airlines, from which he recently retired after thirty-five years; it provided steady income, insurance, and low-cost air travel.

Sweeney has exhibited his text-based, humor-driven conceptualism at galleries and museums in Paris, Barcelona, Vienna, Florence, and Havana, to name a few. Nationally, he has shown extensively. Gary’s humor is especially apparent in his public artwork scattered throughout the United States, most notably in Denver International Airport, San Antonio International Airport, The Green in Charlotte, North Carolina, and The Esplanade on Navigation in Houston, Texas.

Sweeney’s most recent and ambitious project to date took place in 2016. After selling the family house in Manhattan Beach, Gary took occupancy of the empty building and covered the exterior with enlarged family photos spanning the seventy years of Sweeney history. The installation drew thousands of visitors, and was featured nationally and internationally in press and video.

Though he and his wife now live in San Antonio, Texas, he remains, as one critic put it, “one of those rare artists who possesses both the necessary skill to create stylish work and the wit and intelligence to give substance to it.”