b. 1974, United Kingdom
Simon Roberts (b.1974) is a visual artist based in Brighton, UK. Widely recognised for his large-format, tableaux photographs of the British landscape, his practice also encompasses video, text and installation work, which together, interrogate notions of identity and belonging, and the complex relationship between history, place and culture
He has exhibited widely and his photographs reside in major public and private collections, including the George Eastman House, Deutsche Börse Art Collection and Victoria & Albert Museum. In 2010 he was appointed the official British Election Artist by the House of Commons Works of Art Committee to produce a visual record of the General Election on behalf of the UK Parliamentary Art Collection; and in 2014 he represented Britain during the UK-Russia Year of Culture. He has been commissioned to make several large-scale public artworks and recognised with numerous awards including an Honorary Fellowship to the Royal Photographic Society, the Vic Odden Award and grants from Arts Council England and the John Kobal Foundation.
Author of several critically acclaimed monographs including Motherland (Chris Boot, 2007), We English (Chris Boot, 2009), Pierdom (Dewi Lewis Publishing, 2013) and Merrie Albion – Landscape Studies of a Small Island (Dewi Lewis Publishing, 2017), his work has also been profiled and published widely including in the New Yorker, Granta, National Geographic, ArtForum, Wallpaper, amongst others.
Roberts holds a BA Hons in Cultural Geography from The University of Sheffield, and is a regular public speaker and visiting lecturer. Outside of his own professional practice he is involved with several not for profit organisations having formerly served as a trustee of Photoworks and currently working as an ambassador for FotoDocument and the Positive View Foundation.