The artist,
in their own hand.
Cape Town to Los Angeles to Baton Rouge to South Florida to Sonoma County, and home again to the Florida Gulf coast — a practice gathered across continents, hospitals, museums, and classrooms.
Taryn Möller Nicoll is an artist, curator, and arts administrator born in Cape Town, South Africa. She immigrated to the United States in 2004 and has built an interdisciplinary practice across fine art, art education, curatorial work, creative placemaking, and arts administration.
She earned her BFA from Otis College of Art and Design, Los Angeles, in 2012, and her MFA from Louisiana State University in 2017.
Her studio practice examines the intersection of fine art, medical science, and the human body. Working in close collaboration with patients, physicians, and her own family, she documents transformative experiences — pregnancy, reconstructive surgery, neurological disease, and cancer treatment — and abstracts the artefacts of medical encounter: x-rays, ultrasounds, and surgical materials.
The human body is the envelope rendering us equal in fragility and resilience — the vehicle through which I investigate complexity and humanity. — Counter / Shading, Gallery Route One, 2024
Recent work — including the 2024 solo Counter / Shading at Gallery Route One — turns toward refreshed notions of the good and the beautiful in a post-pandemic era. Pieces such as Imago, Epistasis, Glide-Flexion and Extension, and Morula deconstruct elements of botanical illustration, anatomy, and the figure, reorganising them by formal characteristic rather than original context.
Her practice advocates for racial and cultural equity in the arts, with particular attention to immigrants, LGBTQIA+ individuals, people with disabilities, women of color, and BIPOC communities.
In early 2026 she was Chief Curator of In Vivo: Within the Living at the Sonoma State University Art Gallery, an exhibition gathering her own work with faculty and graduate students from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
Her debut exhibition appeared at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Subsequent venues include the Johns Hopkins Welch Medical Library, the New Orleans Pharmacy Museum, and the Shaw Center for the Arts in Baton Rouge. She was a 2024 Gallery Route One Artist Fellow and an Artist in Residence at the LSU Neuroscience Center of Excellence.
As a curator she has worked internationally — with the Beijing Museum of Contemporary Art, TEDA Museum of Modern Art (Tianjin), and the Center for Contemporary Art Afghanistan — and has lectured on the fusion of art and science at the University of Pretoria and the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases in Magdeburg.
Coverage of her work has appeared on PBS’s Art Loft, CBS’s Focus on South Florida, WLRN News, and the Sun Sentinel. Her exhibition In Vivo was featured in the Sonoma State Star in 2026.
She is now based in Clearwater, Florida, on the Gulf coast.
She most recently served as Arts & Culture Administrator for the City of Healdsburg, California, and as Adjunct Professor of Art History at Sonoma State University, where she taught Museum & Gallery Methods. Earlier, she was Chief Curator and Head of Cultural Projects for the City of Pembroke Pines, Florida, directing the Frank C. Ortis Art Gallery from 2019 to 2022. She has held teaching positions at Nova Southeastern University, Louisiana State University, and the Healdsburg Center for the Arts.
Education
- 2017Master of Fine Arts. Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge.
- 2012Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honors. Otis College of Art and Design, Los Angeles.
Selected exhibitions
- 2024Solo · Counter / Shading. Gallery Route One, Point Reyes Station, CA. February 17 – March 17.
- SoloDebut exhibition. Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
- GroupThe Body / The Archive. Johns Hopkins Welch Medical Library, Baltimore, MD.
- GroupAnatomies of Care. New Orleans Pharmacy Museum, LA.
- GroupPractice / Patient. Shaw Center for the Arts, Baton Rouge, LA.
Awards & residencies
- 2024Artist Fellow. Gallery Route One, Point Reyes Station, CA.
- PastArtist in Residence. LSU Neuroscience Center of Excellence.
Curatorial
- 2026Chief Curator · In Vivo: Within the Living. Sonoma State University Art Gallery. With Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.
- 2022–25Arts & Culture Administrator. City of Healdsburg, CA.
- 2019–22Chief Curator and Head of Cultural Projects. City of Pembroke Pines, Frank C. Ortis Art Gallery, FL.
- GuestCurator and Researcher. Beasley Foundation for the sculptural arts.
- GuestCurator. Beijing Museum of Contemporary Art.
- GuestCurator. TEDA Museum of Modern Art, Tianjin.
- GuestCurator. Center for Contemporary Art Afghanistan.
- PastCuratorial Assistant. Louisiana Art and Science Museum, Baton Rouge.
Teaching
- 2022–25Adjunct Professor of Art History. Sonoma State University. Museum & Gallery Methods.
- PastAdjunct Professor of Art. Nova Southeastern University, FL.
- PastArt Instructor. Louisiana State University.
- PastTeaching Artist. Healdsburg Center for the Arts.
- Adv.Grant Program Advisor. Broward County Cultural Division.
Selected lectures
- —The Fusion of Art and Science. University of Pretoria, South Africa.
- —Visual Investigations of the Body. German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases, Magdeburg.
- —Career Development for Artists. Dresden University of Technology.
- —Museum Studies and Gallery Practices. University of South Alabama; Nicholls State University.
- —Artist Lecture. Johns Hopkins University.
Press
- 2026Sonoma State Star. In Vivo exhibition feature.
- PBSArt Loft. Television feature.
- CBSFocus on South Florida. Television feature.
- PrintThe Sun Sentinel. Newspaper coverage.
- RadioWLRN News. South Florida public media.
- PrintVoyageMIA. Artist interview, 2019.