We are so excited to have Paul Richmond in the lineup for The Art of Being Queer Exhibition!
Artist Statement:
Paul Richmond is an internationally recognized visual artist and activist whose career has included exhibitions in galleries and museums throughout the United States as well as publication in numerous art journals and anthologies. His work is collected by individuals around the globe. In his role as the Associate Art Director for Dreamspinner Press and their young adult imprint, Harmony Ink Press, he has created over four hundred novel cover illustrations. He is a co-founder of the You Will Rise Project, an organization that empowers those who have experienced bullying to speak out creatively through art. He lives with his husband Dennis and two whippets in Monterey, California. He works and teaches at Open Ground Studios in Seaside.
Paul’s paintings are an investigation of identity, vulnerability, and human nature. Reality and abstraction compete within the figurative foundation of each piece to make the subjects’ inner struggles more tangible. He often draws upon personal history to approach universal themes. The expressive application of pigment reduces the literalness of the depiction, engaging with an exploration of color, form, shape, and pattern as windows into the psyche. By deconstructing and rebuilding the figure, his paintings invite understandings that reach beyond the immediate surface and reveal the complexity of the individual.
Original pieces featured in The Art of Being Queer Exhibition:
Paul discussing "If I Could Reach The Stars" With The Art of Being Queer.
The Art of Being Queer Exhibition explores and celebrates queer artists and their work from around the globe. It provides an identity experience through which we assimilate the ongoing fight for queer representation not only in the art industry, but in mainstream media as a whole. This exhibition is curated by The Art of Being Queer, a growing organisation and podcast that highlights the censorship queer artists of all mediums face every day, and provides a platform on which these artists can showcase their work that is otherwise underrepresented, rejected, or hidden altogether.
The exhibition features multiple artists, all of whom have had different societal experiences and individual sets of struggles linked to their identity. Through art of many types, these brave artists demonstrate that identity, in its purest form, is not defined by biology or culture, but by what is felt within.
The exhibition takes place at Pineapple Black Gallery on the 27th, 28th, and 29th of September during Middlesbrough Art Weekender. We would love for you to join us for our launch event on Friday 27th September, 5pm-8pm.
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