About

Lives and works in London, UK

Kes Richardson lives and works in London. Richardson’s large-scale paintings appear to be impulsive and expressionist in execution but are in fact carefully planned. Working with small marker pen drawings, paint palettes, an iphone, laptop and projector, he scales-up, samples and manipulates his own imagery in a conversation between real and virtual worlds. For Richardson the digital tools become collaborators, providing removal from the creative act and suggesting surprising propositions. The resulting paintings render the inconsequential monumental and investigate ideas on authenticity, performance, time, space and humour. 

Richardson started his series of “Nursery Droorings” in 2021 when he began collaging together sections of small drawings into larger compositions as a basis for his paintings. He felt that the interlocking marks and forms began to suggest natural phenomena, such as cloud structures or galactic nebulae, while still retaining an aesthetic that evoked children’s drawings. Stellar nurseries are the places where stars are born, nursery drawings are those made by pre-school children. For Richardson the tension between the cosmic Sublime and the formative daubings of a child is both absurd and poignant. He sees painting as a place where many things can co-exist, the laws of physics are suspended and distances, both spatial and cognitive, become malleable.

CV

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EDUCATION
BA Fine Art Bath Spa University College (1998)

SOLO & DUO EXHIBITIONS
With Ash, and Stumble, Hilda Kortei and Kes Richardson, FOLD Gallery, London, UK (2021)
Passengers Through the Badlands, Auction House, Redruth, UK (2020)
Boat Races and Fizzogs, L21 Gallery, Majorca, Spain (2020)
Droor’ngs, FOLD Gallery, London, UK (2016)
Fair Game, FOLD Gallery, London, UK (2013)
Garden Paintings, FOLD Gallery, London, UK (2013)

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
Goth in a landscape, Handel Evans Gallery, Handel Evans Gallery School of Art, Aberystwyth, Wales, UK (2024)
What abstract art means to me, Alzueta Gallery, Barcelona, Spain (2024)
La Terre est bleue comme une orange, Alzueta Gallery, Madrid, Spain (2024)
Annihilation, OHSH Projects, London, UK (2023)
Ways of Seeing, Jari Lager Gallery, Cologne, Germany (2022)
New Forms, Saatchi Gallery, London, UK (2022)
Support (2nd iteration), ANDOR, London, UK (2020)
Recreational Grounds III, Recreational Grounds, London, UK (2019)
Notes on Painting II, The Koppel Project Hive, London, UK (2019)
Carry on, FOLD Gallery, London, UK (2019)
Do Re Mi Fa So La Te, Griffin Gallery, London, UK (2018)
Clay Rendering, Century Club, London UK (2018)
Painting & Structure, Kennington Residency, London (2017)
Micro Salon 7, Galerie l’Inlassable, Paris (2017)
Steal The Show, 53 Bentinck St, Glasgow (2017)
Plymouth Contemporary, Karst, Plymouth (2017)
Radical Me, Tannery Arts, London (2016)
Pool, Griffin Gallery, London (2016)
Garten a.V., Frontviews Temporary, Berlin, Germany (2015)
P, Horatio Jr., London, UK (2015)
Demolition Derby, FOLD Gallery, London (2015)
Fin, FOLD Gallery, London (2015)
Union of Voices, Horatio Jr., London (2014)
I DID DID I, ASC Gallery, London, UK (2013)
Mudlark, FOLD Gallery, London, UK (2013)
I Remember, A-Side, B-Side Gallery, London, UK (2012)
Silly Things, FOLD Gallery, London, UK (2009)
Drawing with Dolphins, Crimes Town, London, UK (2009)
The Marmite Prize, Studio 1.1, London, UK (2008)
In Dreams, Thomas Cohn, Sao Paulo, Brazil (2008)
Walpurgisnacht, Crimes Town, London, UK (2008)
Mothers, Sartorial Art, London, UK (2008)
How Men Are, Sartorial Art, London, UK (2007)
My Penguin, 39, London, UK (2007)
It Takes Two part 2, Sartorial Art, London, UK (2007)
The Marmite Prize for Painting, The Residency, London, UK (2006)
For Peel, No More Grey, London, UK (2006)
Through the Large Glass, Three Colts Gallery, London, UK (2006)
The Circus Show, Three Colts Gallery, London, UK (2006)
Night on Earth, The Oh! Gallery, London, UK (2005)
Kunst Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland (2005)
Mothers, Oxford House Gallery, London, UK (2004)
Viva Pablo, Bartwells institute, London, UK (2002)
Hung, Drawn & Quartered, Studio Voltaire, London, UK (2001)

ART FAIRS
ART ROTTERDAM, Galleri Kant, Rotterdam, Netherlands (2019)
UNTITLED MIAMI BEACH, FOLD Gallery, Miami, USA (2018)

PIECES IN COLLECTIONS
David Roberts Art Foundation