Andy Harper

ANDY HARPER b. 1971, United Kingdom

Installation view at Patrick Heide Contemporary Art Private Collection, Belgium

“At a Summer Exhibition in the Royal Academy over 15 years ago I spotted a small to mid-size painting whose somewhat surreal imagery of jungle-like dense floral interlacing strangely stood out amongst the hundreds of art works crowding the walls. It was very different from my usual taste but it was intriguing. So I kept going back to the studio fascinated by the variety of styles ranging from photorealistic to gestural and the simply mind-blowing technique and confidence in execution.

That fascination prevails until today and it seems as if Andy can now switch back and forth between the styles and techniques with an even more impressive ease and versatility.�

(Patrick Heide)

AC Oil on canvas 200 x 200 cm 2019 £ 20,000.00 plus VAT

Installation view at Patrick Heide Contemporary Art Private Collection, New York

Installation view at Patrick Heide Contemporary Art Private Collection, USA

Installation view at Patrick Heide Contemporary Art

Pocket of Straws Oil on linen 160 x 120 cm 2018 £ 12,500.00 plus VAT

Installation view at Patrick Heide Contemporary Art

Blind-stitched Oil on linen 160 x 120 cm 2018 ÂŁ 12,500.00 plus VAT

Installation view at Patrick Heide Contemporary Art

Fit for Hobby Oil on canvas 58 x 49 cm 2018 £ 4,800.00 plus VAT

Party Line Oil on canvas 53 x 40 cm 2018 £ 4,000.00 plus VAT

False Flats Oil on canvas 44 x 36 cm 2018 £ 3,500.00 plus VAT

Installation view at Patrick Heide Contemporary Art

Something is happening that is not happening at all Oil on canvas 120 x 150 cm 2017 ÂŁ 12,500.00 plus VAT

Installation view at Patrick Heide Contemporary Art

Be like water Oil on canvas 120 x 150 cm 2017 £ 12,500.00 plus VAT

“Each of Harper’s paintings, its tangles of vegetation morphing into clustering dendrites or even disordered thought itself, toggles between inferences of interior and exterior landscapes.

Harper … speaks for painting as a Janus-faced practice – an abundance of materiality that also operates as a sentient force field; a hypnotic and unknowable zone that strategizes to rewire thought itself.”

(Martin Herbert on Andy Harper)

Head of Movement Oil on linen 81 x 62 cm 2017 £ 7,000.00 plus VAT

Installation view at Patrick Heide Contemporary Art

Ventress Oil on linen 81 x 62 cm 2017 ÂŁ 7,000.00 plus VAT

Mont Royal Oil on canvas 90.3 x 68.3 cm 2019 £ 8,000.00 plus VAT

Thorensen Oil on linen 81 x 62 cm 2017 ÂŁ 7,000.00 plus VAT

Andy Harper’s work is drawn from an abundance of resources. To engage with his paintings means to enter a whole new world on its own terms. References from botany, flora, Victorian and primordial motifs as well as powerful colours and abstract arrangements stimulate our senses and imagination. Many of the earlier paintings were inspired by J. G. Ballard’s 1962 science fiction novel The Drowned World, and its content and denseness still nourishes the more recent works.

The story portrays a post-apocalyptic and unrecognizable London submerged by water and tropical temperatures. The few characters in the book are isolated in the city, while the rest of humanity has chosen refuge at the cooler poles. Ballard’s vision of isolation and its psychological undercurrents during a world in crisis hauntingly fits into our current times.

Harper’s paintings are full of detail, crafted by thousands of precisely executed brush strokes that are technically incredibly versatile and result in hugely complex compositions of often unexpected clarity and luminosity. The driving mechanism in his work is the play with movement, colour, depth, and particularly light and shade. From his early photo-realistic “grass paintings” to the “vegetation” paintings, up to the more recent series of more geometrical and abstract works such as the “radial symmetry” pieces or the works with monochrome colour blocks, the process of painting remains similar and impressive. Technically based on a membrane of oily paint that is wet and totally malleable, Harper’s arrangements are recently much looser in appearance, the associations much freer. And yet, a moment of obsession and perfection is still perceptible; it is this contradiction of experimenting with different techniques and visual references that imbues Harper’s work with so much vigour, beauty and tension.

Gua, oil on canvas, 35 x 35 cm, 2016 £ 3,000.00 plus VAT

Luj, oil on canvas, 35 x 35 cm, 2016 £ 3,000.00 plus VAT

Gong Shower, oil on linen, 36 x 36 cm, 2016 £ 3,200.00 plus VAT, incl. frame

Adobe Oil on canvas 140 x 200 cm 2017 £ 17,000.00 plus VAT

Adobe (detail)

The prison of medium scale Oil on linen 20 x 15 cm 2009 ÂŁ 1,800.00 plus VAT

The Line of Ornament Oil on linen 46 x 56 cm 2008 £ 5,000.00 plus VAT

Installation view at Patrick Heide Contemporary Art

“Time Sickness is a term J.D. Ballard used in his science fiction model “The Drowned World” to describe its characters loss of a sense of time and ultimately reality.”

Time Sickness Oil on linen 190 x 300 cm, two panels 2007 ÂŁ 24,000.00 plus VAT

“Already the sheer size of Time Sickness (190 x 300 cm) combined with the abundance of visual information are overwhelming. Its seemingly uncontrolled undulating thick jungle of plants is spirally sucked into an abyss, where it seems to disappear - flora and fauna are taking over our world, menacing and simultaneously beautiful. An existing reality is absorbed, while a new one is in creation.�

Panorama Oil on curved board 122 x 244 cm 2000 £ 22,000.00 plus VAT

Underground River Oil on board 54 x 155 cm 2005 £ 9,500.00 plus VAT

Head Oil on canvas 150 x 120 cm 2019 £ 12,500.00 plus VAT

Rohrbach Oil on canvas 120 x 95 cm 2020 £ 10,000.00 plus VAT

ANDY HARPER Born in 1971, United Kingdom Lives and works in Cornwall, UK Education 1989-90 1990-93 1993-95 1997-99

Torquay Tech, Foundation Course in Art and Design Brighton Polytechnic, B.A. Fine Art Painting Royal College of Art, M.A. Fine Art Painting Middlesex University, M.A. Visual Culture

Selected Solo Exhibitions 2019 2018 2017 2016 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007

What remains to be said, Nancy Toomey Fine Art, San Francisco Plastic Fox, Patrick Heide Contemporary Art, London Andy Harper, Lux Institute of Art, San Diego Sol, Danese Corey, New York Soft Errors, Patrick Heide Contemporary Art, London The Pleasures of Thinking, Morgen Contemporary, Berlin The Angels of History, The Page Gallery, Seoul Archaeology in Reverse, Newlyn Art Gallery Festival Britain, James Freeman Gallery, London New Paintings, Danese, New York Towards a New Architecture, The Page Gallery, Seoul Truthwall, Morgen Contemporary, Berlin An Orrery for Other Worlds, Aspex, Portsmouth Danese Gallery, New York Silent Generation, One in the Other, London The Ballad of Mistah Bones, Frost and Reed, London

Selected Group Exhibitions 2020 2019 2018 2017 2015 2014 2012 2011 2010 2009

2008

2007

2006

Abstraction: Cool and Hot, Danese Corey , New York Angels, James Freeman Gallery, London A Solar Umbrella, Gallery 46, London Summer, Nancy Toomey Fine Art, San Francisco referenced, Danese Corey, New York The First Humans, Pumphouse Gallery, London Silence, ESMoA, El Segundo Museum of Art, Los Angeles Merge Festival, Bankside, London Looking Glass, Bernhard Bischoff and Partner Galerie, Bern In the Presence of Light, Danese, New York Latitude Contemporary Art Prize, (winner), Latitude Festival, Suffolk Twilight Zone, with Minjung Kim and Chrystel Lebas, Galerie Morgen, Berlin Now you see it, Cafe Gallery Projects, Southwark Park, London Wall Painting, FringMK, Milton Keynes Forces of Nature, Danese Gallery, New York Pattern Recognition, Leicester City Art Gallery Wastelands, Newlyn Art Gallery, Cornwall Timbuktu, Pallas Contemporary Projects, Dublin This is not a fairy tale, Patrick Heide Gallery, London Whispers of Immortality, Natalia Goldin Gallery, Stockholm Drift, Thames River, curated by Illuminate Productions Darkness Visible, Galway Arts Centre, Ireland Curios Nature, Newlyn Art Gallery, Cornwall Intervention, Fieldgate Gallery, London Obsession durch Technik, Art Mbassy Gallery, Berlin Dorian Gray, Vegas Gallery, London Sovereign European Art Prize, Club Row, London Behemoth, Danielle Arnaud Gallery, London Toffee Armistice, Lemon Sky Projects, Miami, USA John Moores 24, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool Core, Illuminate Productions, London

2006-05 2002 2001

2000 1999

Jerwood Drawing Prize, Jerwood Space, London and UK tour 2005 Garden History Museum, Parabola/Danielle Arnaud Mostyn Open, Oriel Mostyn, Llandudno, Wales drive for show, putt for dough, Standpoint Gallery, London megareal, K3, Zurich, Switzerland ...and then we take Berlin, Kitchener City Hall, Canada Coast, Artsway open, collaboration with Abigail Reynolds east of eden – art : nature : society, Spacex Gallery, Exeter, Devon Art X III, Haus Ennepetal and Hattingen Gallery, Germany A-movie-A-night, Braziers International Artists Workshop. Secret garden, Angel Row Gallery, Nottingham The Flower Show: flowers in art in the 20th century, Harewood House, Leeds Turf Accountants, The Economist Plaza