108 MICHAEL CRAIG-MARTIN


OFTEN DESCRIBED as the godfather of the Young British Artists due to his mentoring of a precocious generation of students at London’s Goldsmiths College in the 1980s, Michael Craig-Martin is one of the most influential artists and teachers of his generation. A key figure in British art, he is celebrated for his wall paintings and architectural-scale installations that combine graphic line drawings and vivid colours to interrogate the relationship between objects and their representation. His vocabulary of recognisable forms – from buckets, torches, lightbulbs and shoes, to books, stepladders, mobile phones and laptops – appear in his works at varying scales, either


isolated against flat monochromatic planes, or overlapping in complex constellations. Characterised by their precise draughtsmanship, these colourful forms feature in permanent commissions in buildings around the world and have appeared in temporary installations at numerous museums and galleries. Tis autumn, they are filling the Royal Academy of Arts (RA) in London as part of the largest retrospective of the artist’s work ever to be held in the UK (21 September – 10 December 2024). Craig-Martin was born in Ireland and spent his formative years in the US, studying at Yale University School of Art and Architecture before moving to London in 1966, where he


has lived ever since. As an artist, he has made a career of subverting the ordinary and making the familiar seem strange. His early experimental sculptures, several of which are displayed in the RA exhibition, incorporate various everyday objects. On the Table (1970), for example, comprises four metal buckets of water that serve as a counterbalance to the suspended table top on which they stand. One of his most famous works from this period, An Oak Tree (1973), consists of nothing more than a glass of water on a shelf and an accompanying text in which he attempts to convince the viewer that he has in fact transformed this humble object into an oak


Left Michael Craig-Martin, Eye of the Storm, 2003. Acrylic on canvas, 335.3x279.4cm


Collection Irish Museum of Modern Art, Purchase, 2005 © Michael Craig-Martin. Photo: Prudence Cuming Associates


Opposite page, top left Michael Craig-Martin, Untitled (papercup), 2014. Acrylic on aluminium, 122x122cm Gagosian, London © Michael Craig-Martin Photo: Mike Bruce


Opposite page, bottom left Michael Craig-Martin, Untitled (corkscrew), 2014. Acrylic on aluminium, 122x122cm Private collection © Michael Craig-Martin Photo: Mike Bruce


Image courtesy of Gagosian


Opposite page, top right Michael Craig-Martin, An Oak Tree, 1973. Assorted objects and printed text, 15x46x14cm Courtesy the artist © Michael Craig-Martin


Opposite page, bottom right Michael Craig Martin, Sea Food, 1984. Steel rod and oil paint on aluminium, 228.6x172.7cm


Waddington Custot, London © Michael Craig-Martin


ALL IMAGES: COURTESY OF GAGOSIAN


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