David Shrigley

David Shrigley uses humour and brutal honesty as artistic means. His drawings, paintings and animated films are often based on an interaction between the image and the text, while his sculptures, sound installations and interventions in public spaces combine striking visual force with subtle jokes. He finds food for his biting satire in clichés and conversations between people in daily life, but also in the art world. Inflatable Swan Thing and The Artist are two performative installations by Shrigley that question the concept of art and the traditional understanding of authorship.

There are probably not many artists whose works are on display in museums, galleries and art fairs, but also sold in the fashion and lifestyle sector. The Inflatable Swan Thing has its origins in an idea that was born out of necessity: when David Shrigley was faced with the problem of a sculpture that was too large to transport to Japan, without a moment’s hesitation he produced an inflatable version – problem solved! This work was followed by a series of smaller, affordable swans for swimming pools. Shrigley does not see his art as being restricted to a particular medium. This applies as much to the development of his ideas as it does to their implementation in form and materials. The installation The Artist produces drawings continuously, but they are not created by the artist’s hand. Instead, a small robot (a vacuum cleaner wearing a wig) guides the pens that it holds in its nostrils. Shrigley, whose work largely begins with drawing, clearly reveals one thing with this installation: the execution is not the actual moment of artistic creation. The artistic act always lies in the idea, whatever technique or medium is used. When it comes to the distribution of his works, Shrigley is also more open than is common in the art market. His works are not only on sale in renowned galleries and at international art fairs; they can also be mass-produced items available for purchase in his online shop and from other vendors. This form of boundary crossing and consciously playing with the conventions of particular environments – and especially the customs of the art world – are themes to which Shrigley constantly returns. Humour always plays an important role in his work, but the questioning that he expresses with it raises issues of serious concern for him. He not only questions the hierarchies that are used to distinguish between “high” and “low” art, or between high culture and subculture; he also playfully moves between these fields and between different media. He takes aim both at his role as an artist and at the rules that the art world keeps trying to impose on him.

Johanna Adam

David Shrigley studied at the Glasgow School of Art
in Scotland from 1988 to 1991.
He was a Turner Prize nominee in 2013.