Michael Craig-Martin

b. 1941, Ireland

Irish painter, born 1941, active in England

Michael Craig-Martin, one of the most influential artists and teachers of his generation, was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1941 and educated in the United States where he studied History at Fordham University, New York, from 1955-59 before going on to attain a BA and an MFA in Fine Art at Yale University from 1961-66. He returned to Europe in the mid-1960s and had his first solo exhibition in London in 1969. Craig-Martin was a key figure in the first generation of British conceptual artists, teaching at Bath Academy of Art, Canterbury College of Art and, eventually, Goldsmiths College, University of London, from 1974-1988 and 1994-2000, where he had a significant influence on two generations of young British artists.

Craig-Martin has developed a distinctive style over the past 50 years through the compilation of a whole vocabulary of objects realised through a variety of media including painting, sculpture, drawing, printing and animations.

His most recent major exhibitions include Seoul Arts Centre, Hangaram Art Museum, Seoul, Republic of Korea (2022); W1 Curates, Oxford Street, London (2020); the Gallery at Windsor, Vero Beach, Florida (2019); Discover Green, Houston (2019), Gallery Hyundai, Seoul (2017, 2012); Himalayas Museum, Shanghai, which toured to Hubei Museum of Art, Wuhan (2015); Serpentine, London (2015); Goss-Michael Foundation, Dallas (2015,

2010); Chatsworth House, Derbyshire (2014); Luther W. Brady Art Gallery, George Washington University, Washington D.C. (2012) and Roche Court, Wiltshire (2011). Major retrospective exhibitions include Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin (2006) and Whitechapel Gallery, London (1989).

In 2001 Craig-Martin was appointed CBE; in the same year, he was appointed Emeritus Professor of Fine Art by Goldsmiths College. In 2006 he was elected to the Royal Academy of Arts, and in 2015 was the Chief Co-ordinator of the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, London. In 2015 Art / Books published a book of Craig-Martin's collected writings. In 2016 he was awarded a knighthood.

His work is held in numerous museum collections around the world including Tate, London; Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; The Berardo Collection, Lisbon; National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; Harvard University Art Museums, Massachusetts; Museum of Modern Art, New York.

Cristea Roberts Gallery is the exclusive worldwide representative for Michael Craig-Martin's drawings and original prints.

Michael Craig-Martin lives and works in London.