CONTEMPORARY ART STOCKROOM Richard Blackwell

VIRTUAL TOUR

With a particular focus on drawing, scale and facsimile, Richard Blackwell’s playful abstractions mimic architectural interiors and building facades as well as basic materials like paint, metal, paper and rope. Referencing traditions in modern painting, Blackwell’s works are materially and spatially deceptive but also simple, bold and direct. His current body of work presents formal, steel 'collages' that play with the use of geometric, architectonic illusions. They at times adhere to a spatial logic but also defy it through the use of layering and the addition of marks made familiar in collage and painting, such as masking tape tabs and spray paint drips. These works evoke a visual account of the sensory phenomena found in the intimate yet passing moments within a city.

'My current work exists in a contemporary context where virtual and physical realities continuously blur together. They are objects that attempt to be 'reverse' sculptures, the perception of which is activated and deactivated by the viewer moving around them. More broadly my work revisits traditional representational devices and methodologies, approaching them in alternative ways. By altering the physical I can attempt to reveal the virtual subtext that penetrates everyday life.'

Blackwell was a recipient of the 2012 Fulbright Scholarship and completed his Masters in Fine Art at the School of Art Institute of Chicago in 2014. In 2011 Blackwell exhibited a major series GROTTO, an exhibition in 3 volumes, which was shown in Canberra, Melbourne and Chicago and supported by the Australia Council of the Arts. His work has been collected for ARTBANK, NAB Collection, The Justin Collection and has been profiled in Australian Art Review. Most recently he has been working and residing in Doha, Qatar in an academic capacity.