NICOLA ANTHONY | THE WORK
STATEMENT
Using text, stories and voices as sculptural materials, and sentences as lines with which to draw, Nicola Anthony has a fascination in the little moments, secrets and stories of life. Her artwork is inspired by language, memory, mapping, collecting, biological references & literary sources. Her sculptural works & drawings possess delicate, rich and sometimes chaotic forms, built up & constructed through layers of detail & assemblage.
Nicola’s self proclaimed obsession is with the way we read meaning into texts and artworks, the ‘semantics’ of images & symbols: “The way in which viewers join the dots can alter the work in their eyes. This means my art can be playful and changing - I enjoy the viewer’s interpretations becoming part of the art, and the art becoming personal to them.” This links closely to her fascination with the connection between the materials, the senses and the experience of artworks.
Recent work includes ‘The Post Box’s Tale’, featured at the Poole Literary Festival: A replica of a Royal mail post box constructed using strings of sentences, laser cut from paper, & telling the story of the Post Box and all the things it has seen on it’s street corner. Other work includes ‘I find myself looking at you’, a series of glass and acrylic works inspired by organic structures, detail, fragility and pattern, whilst interwoven with fragments of the genetic code and secrets revealed to her by anonymous audiences.
Recently featured in a SKYArts interview with the artist, the process of collecting these secrets & words has been an ongoing project to gather responses from a large number of people: During exhibitions, events, through the artist’s website and through word of mouth. They have been beautiful, moving, dark, funny, intriguing, rude, touching, and varied. The collection exists both as an evolving text artwork and a whispered sound work.
Nicola Anthony uses these sentences and secrets to inspire and construct her new works: “I use sentences to structure the work, I start applying them as marks and drawing with them as lines. One of my favourite things about seeing people view my work is when they come up really close to read the words, and start stretching and crouching and shuffling along in front of the work as they follow the sentences – the only type of line you can draw which insists people look at every component of it from left to right.”
CV
EDUCATION
2003 - 2006 Fine Art First Class (Hons), Loughborough University
2001 - 2003 Central St. Martins, London Institute
2000 - 2002 International Baccalaureate, Goffs School and Language College
SOLO EXHIBTIONS
29-31 Oct 2010 Poole Literary Festival, Lighthouse Centre for the Arts, Poole
May 2010 Artwork featured at Tate Modern in Tate Community exhibition
26 Oct 2009 'I find myself listening' sound artwork featured on The Arts Show, Xstream East Radio
6 Aug 2009 Interview on SKYArts TV of Nicola Anthony and Sue Luminati in the artist’s studio
2 Aug 2009 Commissioned by well known 'Plinther' Sue Luminati (Poole Lit Fest) to create Antony Gormley Plinth sculpture: Trafalgar Square, www.oneandother.co.uk
2009-2011 Work on show at the Cass Business School, London
14 Jan - 08 Feb 2009 Freeze Frame, Candid Gallery, Angel, London
1 - 5 Feb 2009 SpringFair International 09, Birmingham NEC
27 Nov 2008 Open Studio Viewing, Bow, London
23 - 25 Aug 2008 Summer Exhibition, Gravely Barn, Hertfordshire
11 - 21 Dec 2007 Postcard, Surface Gallery
10 - 17 Aug 2007 Nicola Anthony: Looking into You, Hunters House, Herts
3 - 23 July 2007 Bakers Dozen, interactive e-exhibition
25 May - 10 Jun 2007 ‘I Find Myself…’ and works from the SugarCube Project, Stubbs Rich, Bath
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
29 Oct - 4 Nov 2010 Ornamental, Red Gate Gallery, London
7th - 21st Nov 2009 National Open Art Competition, Finalist
23 - 25 Oct 2009 London Artists Collective at: The Islington Contemporary Art & Design Fair 2010
24 Aug - 13 Sep 2009 Candid Gallery Angel, London
22 - 25 Feb 2009 Focus-on-Imaging Show, Hahnemuehle FineArt, Birmingham NEC
3 - 5 Oct 2008 The Islington Contemporary Art & Design Fair
11 - 13 July 2008 Absorb Arts: Open Studios
22 May - 8 Jun 2008 Your Scene, Candid Art Gallery, Islington, London
7 May – 22 Jun 2008 InsideOut, Hertford Temporary Art Space, Hertfordshire
Jan - Jun 2008 A Cat may look at a King, touring exhibition with the Bakers Dozen Artist Collective
7 - 12 Dec 2007 Postcard, Surface Gallery, Nottingham
19 - 22 Oct 2007 The Affordable Art Fair; The Autumn Collection, London
10 - 13 May 2007 The Newcastle Gateshead Art Fair, Newcastle
19 - 22 Oct 2006 The Affordable Art Fair; The Autumn Collection, London
AWARDS
2009 National Open Art Competition Finalist
2006 AstraZeneca First Prize Commission Winner
COLLECTIONS
London Artists Collective
AstraZeneca Art collection
Cass Business School temporary collection
New British Artists
Customers United Corporate Collection
Goffs School and Language College
COMMISSIONS
2010 Commissioned by the Poole Literary Festival to create a literary 'Word Sculpture' which could be used as a base for creative workshops and lateral thinking. Nicola Anthony also ran children's workshops during the festival.
2010 Commissioned by well known 'Plinther' Sue Luminati of Poole Literary Festival to create book based sculpture for Antony Gormley Plinth: Trafalgar Square, London
2008 Interactive sculpture commissioned by Random Monkey Productions, Brighton (for planned exhibition to coincide with a theatre production, 2009)
2007 Customers United - Corporate artworks due for presentation 2008
2006 AstraZeneca First Prize Commission Winne
PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS
Present The London Theatre Consortium (Young Vic, BAC, Soho Theatre, Lyric
Hammersmith, The Tricycle, Donmar Theatre, Royal Court Theatre, Royal Theatre
Stratford East, Hampstead Theatre, Almeida, Bush Theatre) - Project Co-ordinator
Present London Festival Fringe
Present Poole Literary Festival
PRESENT LONDON ARTISTS COLLECTIONS
Present Ben Uri Gallery - The London Jewish Museum of Art
2007 - 2010 Hahnemühle FineArt
2007 - 2009 Baker’s Dozen Artist Collective
2007 - Present The London Print Studio
2007 Hot House - Free Form's specialist centre for regeneration through the arts and
creative industries
2006 New British Artists
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Oct 2010 One & Other, by Antony Gormley, featured entry 648, ISBN: 9780224090780
Jul 2010 Ballad of Bailey Busta Button, word collection project featured on pp. 46
Jun 2010 Poole Literary Festival Catalogue
May 2007 Bath Fringe Festival 2007
May 2007 FAB Visual Arts Program
Apr 2006 IJAYA catalogue
Dec 2006 ‘Creative Sugar Space; Nicola Anthony’, Creature Mag, Issue 4
Jun 2006 LUSAD Fine Art, 2006