Ugo Rondinone is a Swiss contemporary artist working in mixed-media installations that include sculpture, painting, video, sound, and photography. His wide-ranging practice utilizes metaphoric and iconographic images such as clouds, animals, and figures, as well as powerful declarative sayings like “Hell, Yes!” By co-opting the language of psychedelia and advertising, Rondinone conveys his profound interest in the contemplation of everyday life and activities. “I see art-making as a ritual, a meditation for myself,” the artist explains. “It’s to exclude myself from society and to create my own rites…The energy of art is that you can spend time with yourself.” Born in 1964 in Brunne, Switzerland, he went on to study at the Hochschule für Angewandte Kunste in Vienna and moved to New York in 1998. He has represented his home country in the 2007 Venice Biennale, and his work can be found in the permanent collection of the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York. Rondinone lives and works in New York, NY.