TERRY ATKINSON
Iraq 4 - Skew -Talk. 2003 paint and collage on canvas, 83x104 cm
Was born in 1939 in the village of Thurnscoe (Yorkshire)
He Founded two of the most influential artists' groups : Fine Artz , in 1963 with John Bowstead , Roger Jeff, and Bernard Jennings ;
and, Art & Language in 1968 , with David Bainbridge, Michael Baldwin and Harold Hurrell .
Since leaving Art & Language in 1974 , Atkinson has continued his practice as an artist via writings, object-making, and teaching.
Atkinson began teaching at UK art institutions in 1964 at Birmingham College of Art, and then moved to Coventry Collegeof Art in 1966.
From 1977 he taught at Leeds University's Department of Art History 6 Fine Art until 2005.
In 1985 he was nominated for the Turner Prize
YouTube Videos
And Materials and Money and Crisis - Terry Atkinson
Interviewed by Sebastiano Dell’Arte
Terry Atkinson about Galleria Six's booth at Arte Fiera Bologna 2020
Terry Atkinson's Artworks from the 1960s to our days
Exhibition view 2019 Galleria Six
Exhibition view 2017 Galleria Six
Essays Download
FROM ONE CIVIL WAR TO ANOTHER – TIME TRAVELLERS TO THE COLD WAR
THE FLAGS DRAWINGS AND GREASE WORKS
Selected Solo Exhibitions
2022
Terry Atkinson , "opere dal 1962 al 2018"
Galleria Elefante , Treviso ,October - December,
with essay by Elena Forin
18 August - 10 September
Stadtgalerie, Bern (CH)
2021
Greaser sculptures and drawings from the series
"Berlin, East Prussia and the Desert" and "American Civil War"
Josey Gallery, Norwich UK
2019
"American Civil War" Galleria Six, Milan
2017
Galleria SIX , Milan
2014
Yale Union Portland, Oregon
2004
Leeds City Art Gallery , Leeds
2003
Royal Leamington Spa, Art Gallery, Warwickshire
1999
Real Gallery , New York City
1996
Luciano Inga-Pin , Milan
1995
Kunstewerke, Berlin
1991
Irish Museum of Modern Art , Dublin
1991
Gimpel Fils London
1987
Stampa , Basel
1987
Air Gallery , London
1987
Gimpel Fils, London
1985
Gimpel Fils, London
1983
Whitechapel Art Gallery, London
1977
University of Leeds Gallery , Leeds
1977
Robert Self Gallery, London
Selected Group Exhibitions
2023
La Guerra E' Finita! La Pace Non E' Ancora Iniziata
Fondazione Imago Mundi, Treviso
2019
"Intermedia" MART , Rovereto.
2018
Mechanisms-CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts, San Francisco, CA
2016
Double Act: Art and Comedy-Metropolitan Arts Centre (MAC),Belfast, Irlanda del Nord
Raum 1 + 2-Stampa,Basilea
Double Act: Art and Comedy-MAC Belfast,Belfast, Irlanda del Nord
2014
Imma Collection: Conversations-Irish Museum of Modern Art - IMMA,Dublino
2013
and Materials and Money and Crisis-Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig - MUMOK,Vienna
2012
Projects 3 Zeichnung / Drawing 1969 - 1981-Stampa,Basilea
2011
Sculpture In So Many Words: Text Pieces 1960-75-ZieherSmith,New York, NY
2009
privat - Wuppertaler Sammler der Gegenwart-Von der Heydt Museum,Wuppertal
2008
The Map is not the Territory-Esbjerg Kunstmuseum,Esbjerg
ATKINSON - BRISLEY - HEAD-Fieldgate Gallery,Londra
2007
Terry Atkinson und Susi Pop-Zwinger Galerie,Berlino
Sue and Terry Atkinson-Bournville Centre for Visual Arts Birmingham Insti,Birmingham
ShowOff III-Galerie MøllerWitt,Aarhus
2006
The Signings-Keith Talent Gallery,Londra
2005
Drawings and Works on Paper from the IMMA Collection-Irish Museum of Modern Art - IMMA,Dublino
Go Between-Magazin4 - Bregenzer Kunstverein,Bregenz
heal the world-The Third Line - Dubai,Dubai
Sharjah International Art Biennial 7-Sharjah International Art Biennial, Sharjah
2004
AUF PAPIER-Galerie Neher GmbH & Co. KG,Essen
The Solar Anus-Henry Peacock Gallery,Londra
Bearings: Landscapes from the IMMA Collection-Irish Museum of Modern Art - IMMA,Dublino
2003
The Haunted Swing-Collective Gallery,Edimburgo, Scozia
hockerfuckingblocked-Henry Peacock Gallery,Londra
2000
Sentieri Interrotti. Crisi Della Rappresentazione E Iconoclastia Nelle Arti Dagli Anni Cinquanta Alla Fine
Del Secolo-Palazzo Bonaguro,Bassano del Grappa, VI
1999
Museion , Museum ,Bolzano
1997
Amour & Obsession-Galerie Fortlaan 17
1993
Declarations of War-Kettle's Yard,Cambridge, Cambridgeshire
1990
Art Conceptuel Formes Conceptuelles-Galerie 1900-2000,Parigi
1987
State Of The Art: Ideas And Images In The 1980s-Institute of Contemporary Arts,Londra
1986
Human Interest-Cornerhouse,Manchester
City Llfe: An Exhibition In Three Parts - Political Life-Cornerhouse,Manchester
1985
The British Art Show: Old Allegiances and New Directions 1979-1984-Southampton
City Art Gallery,Southampton
The British Art Show: Old Allegiances and New Directions 1979-1984-Royal Scottish Academy,Edimburgo, Scozia
1984
The British Art Show: Old Allegiances and New Directions 1979-1984-Birmingham
Museum & Art Gallery, Birmingham
41 esposizione d'arte La Biennale di Venezia
5th Biennale of Sydney 1984: Private Symbol Social Metaphor-Biennale of Sydney,Sydney, NSW
1982
Hayward Annual 1982: British Drawing-Hayward Gallery,Londra
1980
Printed Art - A View of two Decades-MoMA - Museum of Modern Art,New York, NY
1971
British Avant-Garde-New York Cultural Center,New York, NY
1970
Information-MoMA - Museum of Modern Art,New York, NY
Conceptual Art and Conceptual Aspects-New York Cultural Center,New York, NY
955, 000-Vancouver Art Gallery,Vancouver, BC
1969
557,087-Seattle Art Museum,Seattle, WA
Language III-Dwan Gallery - New York,New York, NY
One Month-Seth Siegelaub Contemporary Art,New York, NY
Selected Bibliography
(1) Terry Atkinson Letter to Lucy Lippard and John Chamberlain concerning their essay ‘The Dematerialization of Art 1968
(2) Essays written or jointly written, in the main exclusively with Michael Baldwin, whilst a founding member of Art & Language 1968-73, and published in the first four volumes of Art-Language.
Introduction Vol.1 No. 1 1969
From an Art & Language Point of View. Vol.1 No 2
Art Teaching,Vol.1 No 4
(3) Essays written and published, as a member of Art & Language, in Studio International, London 1970-72
De Legibus Naturae (written with Michael Baldwin)
Status and Priority (written with Michael Baldwin)
From an Art and Language Point of View (written with Michael Baldwin)
Some Post-War American Work: Ideological Responsiveness (written with Michael Baldwin)
(4) Looking Back: Going On. Part 1 in Fox 1, New York 1975
(5) Looking Back: Going On. Part 2 in Fox 2, New York 1975
(6) Terry Atkinson, Extra No. 3, Cologne, 1975
(7) Notes: Communities, Artists and Modernism in Studio International, London, 1976
(8) Notes in the catalogue of the exhibition titled Notes, Robert Self Gallery London, 1976. The exhibition toured to Midland Group Gallery, Nottingham, 1976, Robert Self Gallery, Newcastle-upon-Tyne 1977, University of Leeds Gallery, 1977.
(9) The State of British Art , a series of public panel discussions held at the Institute of Contemporary art, London. Session 5 (panel Richard Cork, Terry Atkinson, Victor Burgin, Reg Butler, Josef Herman and Lisa Tickner) and published I Studio International, Vol. 194, No. 789, 1978
(10) Materialism, By Jove! in Block, No 1 London 1979
(11) Three essays in the catalogue of the exhibition titled Work, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London 1983. The exhibition toured to the Orchard Gallery, Derry 1983 and to the Van Abbe Museum, Eindhoven, 1984
The three essays
(i) Does the artist have Natural Rights?
(ii) Following a rule: from Russia with love
(iii) Remarks from Hindsight
(12) The Conception of the Artistic Self as a Monad-Like Container, AND magazine Nos 1 and 2, London, 1984-85. Published in two parts.
(13) Late Modernism vs. Post-Modernism, AND Magasine No 7, London 1985
(14) The Art of the New Jerusalems, Artscribe,53, London 1985
(15) Notes on Tourism 1 and 2, University of Essex Gallery,1986
(16) One essay in the catalogue of the exhibition Art for the Bunker, Gimpel Fils Gallery, London 1985 titled Tales from the Bunker.
(17) The exhibition Brit Art 1 A.I.R. Gallery, London 1987 has a catalogue titled Cooking the Books with an essay titled Titles-Talking.
(18) The exhibition Brit Art 2 catalogue, Gimpel Fils, London 1987, has an essay titled Predicament.
(19) The exhibition Mute 1 catalogue, Gallery Prag, Copenhagen, 1988 Orchard Gallery, Derry, 1988, Gimpel Fils Gallery, London 1989 has two essays.
(i) Disaffirmation and Negation
(ii) British Political Art at Coventry (written jointly with Sue Atkinson)
(20) The exhibition Mute 2 , Orchard Gallery, Derry, 1988 has 2 essays.
(i) Mistakes and Anomaly
(ii) Practice: England 1988.
(21) The exhibition catalogue, Emma Lake - 25 Years, Mendel Art Gallery, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada, 1989, has an essay titled From the Lake to the Swamp. Also printed in The Flat Side of the Landscape: The Emma Lake Artist’s Workshop (edited by John O’Brian), Mendel Art Gallery, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada
(22) Rothko, Art Monthly, London, November 1985.
(23) Around the Text, Makkom 2, Amsterdam, 1985
(23) Phantoms of the Studio, Oxford Art Journal, Vol. 3, No. 1,1990
(24) Updated reprints of Tourism 1 and 2 and Re-Writing and Re-Reading Tourism 1 and 2 in the catalogue of the exhibition Tourism 1 and 2, Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver, 1990.
(25) An Evening Forum at the Vancouver Art Gallery (panel, Terry Atkinson, Jeff Wall, Ian Wallis, Lawrence Weiner) (edited by Judith Mastai), Vancouver Art gallery Document II, 1990
(26) Beholding Courbet from the Side, Oxford Art Journal, Vol. 15, No. 1, 1992
(27) Dead Troops Talk in the catalogue of the Exhibition Jeff Wall, Kunstmuzeum, Lucerne, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, Dochtorhalle, Hamburg 1993
(28) Whence the Interregnum? In the catalogue of the exhibition of MA course, Leeds Metropolitan University, Sheffield Hallam University, University of Humberside, 1993
(29) Warhol’s Voice, Beuys’ Face, Crow’s Writing in Art has no History, (edited by John Roberts), Verso, London, 1994
(30) The Indexing, the World War 1 Works and the Ruins of Conceptualism, published jointly by Circa Publications, Belfast, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin and Cornerhouse, Manchester 1996. Also published in Pastor, in English and Russian, Moscow, 1996.
(31) Rudely Prevailed Upon … in Mekons Unlimited, jointly published by Quicksilver Records, Chicago, Polk Museum of Fine Art, Lakeland, Florida and Ellipsis, London, 1996.
(32) Beuys’Voice and the Coyote’s Spirit, Collapse 2, Vancouver Art Forum Society, Canada, 1996
(33) Beuys’ Voice and the Coyote’s Spirit (in Finnish) in Taide, Helsinki, Finland, 1996.
(34) The Siren Song of Dualism, Art Monthly, No 201, London, 1996
(35) The essay The Siren Song of Dualism:Representation and the Reinstallation of the VisuaI in the catalogue of the exhibition Circumstantial Evidence (curated by Peter Seddon and Peter Green), University of Brighton Gallery, Brighton, 1996
(36) Terry Atkinson, Artpress No 17, Paris, 1996
(37) Le Chants de Sirenes du Dualism (The Silent Song of of Dualism) in Omnibus, No.19, Paris, 1997.
(38) Introduction in Don Quixote’s Art & Television, Dave Rushton, Institute of Local Television, Edinburgh, 1998
(39) In the catalogue of the exhibition Cultural Instrument, Real Gallery, 526 West 26th Street, New York, 1999, four essays:
(i) Not so much repositioning the visual, not so much reconceptualising the visual, but …
(ii) The Siren Song of Dualism: Representation and the reinstallation of the visual – unsettled histories of me(s)
(iii) Monitor – Text for Terry Mirrors
(iv) Monitor text for Cultural Instrument (Dumb Canvas Bastard or whatever …)
(40) Curried Chips and Microchips in the catalogue of the exhibition Counter Culture: Common Culture, Common Culture, Cornerhouse, Manchester 1999
(41) History Painting and Recapitulation in History Painting Reassessed (editors Peter Seddon and Peter Green), Manchester University Press, 2000
(42) At the Limit of the Visual, an interview by Lorin Davis, Untitled, London, 2000
(43) Secure Objects and Ancestor Worship: Kitaj’s practice versus transactions of an Art & Language history in Critical Kitaj (editors James Aulich and John Lynch) Manchester University Press, 2000
(44) If We are Logical and Historical Monsters, then so much the better (in Catalan and English), Art i escriptura, Barcelona, 2000
(45) In the catalogue Terry Atkinson: Fragments of a Career, Selected Retrospective Work 1966—99, Silkeborg Museum, Silkeborg, Denmark, 2000, three essays:
(i) Contra_Art: Russellian-type analysis as a resource for dispelling the intuitive basis of the established models of the artistic subject and art object.
(ii) Practices of going-on? Driving the practice: Philosophy- driven practice, politics-driven practice and a history of a friendship of dissent1944-66
(iii) Work Commentaries 1980-2000
(46) Eurostar Avant-Gardism in both directions by dumbing down from London and wising up from Paris in Art for All? Their Policies and Our Culture, (edited by Mark Wallinger and Mary Warnock), Peer, London, 2000
(47) Painting and the Model of the Avant-Garde Subject in the catalogue of the 2002 Degree Exhibition at Glasgow School of Art, 2002
(48) In the catalogue of the exhibition Susan Atkinson – Greenham Work 1983-86/Terry Atkinson – Irish Work 1983-86, International Project Space, Birmingham, UK, 2007, three essays:
(i) Greenham Work Susan Atkinson
(ii) Irish Work Terry Atkinson
(iii) Paper for Susan Atkinson and Terry Atkinson on the occasion of the exhibition: Susan Atkinson-Greenham Work/Terry Atkinson-Irish Work, Rachel Clark
(49) I return to where I left off with the Trotsky Postcards in the magazine As if Something Once Mentioned is Now Plain to See, (edited by Mona Casey and Paul McAree) Colony, Birmingham, UK 2007.
* Also published here Lecher Lines, David Bainbridge - first published in Art-Language Vol. 1, No. 1, 1969 and in Studio International, London July-August, 1970 and in the exhibition Lecher Lines Mark 1 at the Architectural Association, London, 1968 and the Camden Arts Centre, London, 1970.
(50) In the catalogue of the exhibition Terry Atkinson: Ongoing work from the 1990s to the present, Lanchester Gallery, Coventry School of Art & Design, Coventry University, 2009, three essays
(i) Text for Cultural Instrument
(ii) The Turner Prize: Ordering the Avant-Garde
(iii) Practice as Unease
(51) Should Thomas Aquinas or Duns Scotus be the patron saint of the twentieth century art world? Flood (director Paul MacAree) Dublin, 2010
(52) In The Lead and the Invalid: A Counter-Fugue in 13 Parts produced by JCHP (John Charles Henry Peacock) (Dave Smith and Thom Winterburn) 2012, two essays:
(i) JCHP
(ii) Practice as Unease
(53) Vogl’s Combo in the catalogue of the exhibition and Materials and Money and Crisis (curated by Richard Birkett), Museum of Modern Art, Stiftung Ludwig, Vienna, 2013
(54) In the book to accompany the exhibition Critical Décor produced by JCHP for the Lanchester Gallery, Coventry School of Art & Design, Coventry University, 2014, two essays:
(i) Exhibition and Exposition
(ii) Brechtian Persistence
(55) Exhibitionism in the catalogue of the exhibition Critical Décor: A Short Organum for an Exhibition produced by JCHP, 2014
(56) In the booklet to accompany the exhibition Terry Atkinson, (curated by Richard Birkett) Yale Union, Portland, Oregon, 2014-15, a series of excerpts from Atkinson’s writings used in an essay written by Richard Birkett.
(57) In the book Primitive Propositions: A Proposal for an Exhibition, produced by JCHP 2015 two essays:
(i) Exhibitionism, Distributionism, Marketism, Productionism, Wealthism, Lack of Wealthism
(ii) JCHP and the Studio
(58) Grease: Mute and Malleable in the book to accompany the exhibition Mechanism (curated by Anthony Hubermann), Wattis Institute, San Francisco, 2017-18
(59) The AGMOAS (Avant-Garde Model of the Art Subject) is now a Corporate Audit, (Organized by Matthew Poole), University of San Bernadino, Press, California, 2017