Richard Nonas was born in New York in 1936. He studied literature and then social anthropology. Following his education, Nonas worked as an anthropologist for 10 years, doing field-work on American Indians in Northern Ontario, Canada, and in Northern Mexico and Southern Arizona. He turned to sculpture in the mid-1960s at age 30. His anthropological work left a deep imprint that affected his sculptural practice and his engagement with the perception of space. Through a Minimalist vocabulary, Nonas developed a body of sculpture that engaged with the issue of place.

The artist has exhibited extensively in the U.S. and abroad, making small and very large works both indoors and out, and has written extensively on the culturally dependent intellectual and emotional meanings of sculpture, space and place. He has been the subject of several museum and institutional exhibitions, most recently including: FiveMyles, Brooklyn (2020–21); Musee Gassendi, Digne-les- Bains, France (2019); MAMCO Geneve, Switzerland (2019); ‘T’ Space, Rhinebeck, New York (2018); the Art Institute of Chicago (2017); MoMA PS1, New York (2016); MASS MoCA, North Adams, Massachusetts (2016); and the Walker Art Museum, Minneapolis (2012), among others.