Michael Craig-Martin Unveils 'Computer Portrait of Laura Burlington, 2010', at Chatsworth
Michael Craig-Martin Unveils 'Computer Portrait of Laura Burlington, 2010, at Chatsworth
The distinguished artist and influential ex-Goldsmiths tutor who counts Damien Hirst, Ian Davenport and Gary Hume as former students, will unveil a striking new commission exclusively at Chatsworth on 11 March. Commissioned by Lord and Lady Burlington, son and daughter-in-law to the Duke of Devonshire, as a permanent addition to the famous Chatsworth collections, the portrait is quite unlike anything else visitors may expect to find decorating the historic walls at the family home.
The computer portrait goes on display in a new gallery and will be seen by visitors alongside earlier portraits of the Devonshire family by Thomas Gainsborough, Joshua Reynolds, John Singer Sargent, Lucien Freud and Stephen Conroy.
Laura Burlington offers the sitter's perspective:
"Shortly after we were married in 2007, William suggested that I have my portrait painted, so it was around this time that we started to think about whom the artist might be. We wanted to have a picture that was more than just a likeness, that we felt was an interesting piece of art as well as being a portrait. The more contemporary portraits I looked at, the less inspired I felt about the idea; very few seemed really relevant to the time that we live in.
"Michael Craig-Martin is an artist whose practise we have both admired for a long time. He also featured in the inaugural exhibition at Lismore Castle Arts, the contemporary art gallery William founded in 2005. After seeing a digitised [Michael's description] self-portrait by Michael at his show at the Gagosian gallery a couple of years later, we both felt excited that he was interested in portraiture and thought that if he agreed to the commission he would do something really exciting.
"The whole process was very simple from my point of view, and I imagine much more complicated from Michael's. I went for a single sitting; it was very relaxed in his studio in Kings Cross. Michael took a lot of photographs. I then returned to the studio with William a couple of months later - we thought we'd be selecting the drawing that the main portrait was to be based on, but there was the finished work, flashing away. It was such an exciting moment. My face is divided into a number of sections and there are 44 colours that each section could be at any one time. The portrait constantly changes and is unlikely to repeat itself.
"It will be fascinating to see it in the context of the many historic and modern portraits at Chatsworth, and also to find out what visitors think. I like it an indecent amount, considering that it is after all a picture of myself!"
'Computer Portrait of Laura Burlington, 2010' - Technical Information:
The portrait consists of custom made hardware using a 52" monitor mounted vertically to hang on the wall like a framed painting. The software for the work uses a black line portrait of the sitter by Michael Craig-Martin which is divided into nine different areas of colour: skin, hair, lips, teeth, eyebrows, shirt, etc.
Each of these areas of colour slowly fade from one colour to another through a pallette of 44 colours chosen by the artist. Each colour appears for between five and 15 seconds. As there is no loop, no tape, and no cd/dvd used in this work, there is no repetition. The computer portrait is 'live', programmed to randomly make all decisions concerning colour choice and duration. As there are millions of combinations possible, there is virtually no possibility that anyone will ever see again the exact combination visible at any given moment.
Artist Profile:
Michael Craig-Martin was born in Dublin Ireland in 1941. He grew up and was educated in the United States, studying Fine Art at the Yale University School of Art. He came to Britain on completion of his studies in 1966, and has lived and worked there ever since.
His first solo exhibition was at the Rowan Gallery, London in 1969. He participated in the definitive exhibition of British conceptual art, "The New Art" at the Hayward Gallery in 1972. Throughout his career, through work in many different media, he has explored the expressive potential of commonplace objects and images. His best known works include: An oak tree of 1973, in which he claimed to have changed a glass of water into an oak tree; his large-scale black and white wall drawings; and his intensely coloured paintings, installations, and public commissions.
Over the past 15 years he has done exhibitions and site specific installations in
numerous museums and public galleries including Kunsthaus Bregenz, the Centre Pompidou, MoMA, the Kunstvereins in Hannover, Dusseldorf, and Stuttgart, IVAM in Valencia, the Magasin in Grenoble, the Arp Museum in Rolandseck, and the National Art Center Tokyo. He represented Britain in the 23rd Sao Paulo Biennal. A retrospective of his work was presented at the Whitechapel Art Gallery in London 1989 and at the Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin in 2006.
Craig-Martin is well known to have been an influential teacher at Goldsmiths College London, and is considered a key figure in the emergence of the young British artists in the early 90s. Amongst his former students are Ian Davenport, Damien Hirst, Gary Hume, Liam Gillick, Michael Landy, Sarah Lucas, Julian Opie, and Fiona Rae.
He was an Artist Trustee of the Tate Gallery from 1989-99, received a CBE in 2001, and was elected to the Royal Academy in 2006.
A comprehensive and fully illustrated book on his work, written by the critic Richard Cork, was published by Thames and Hudson in 2006. He is represented by the Gagosian Gallery.
Ends
Notes to Editors:
• William and Laura are the Earl and Countess of Burlington, son and daughter-in-law of the present Duke and Duchess of Devonshire.
• Chatsworth re-opens on March 14. For more information please visit www.chatsworth.org
For further information on Chatsworth, please contact:
Liz Bee (lizb@redbrickcommunications.com)
Helen Morton (helenm@redbrickcommunications.com)
Redbrick Communications, 68 St James's Street, Nottingham, NG1 6FJ
T: 0115 910 1500 F: 0115 910 1490 www.redbrickcommunications.com