Martin Creed

Martin Creed (born 1968) is an artist and musician. He won the Turner Prize in 2001 for Work No. 227: the lights going on and off, which was an empty room in which the lights went on and off.

Life and work

Martin Creed was born in Wakefield, England, and brought up in Glasgow, Scotland. He studied art at the Slade School of Art at University College London from 1986 to 1990.

Since 1987, Creed has numbered each of his works, and most of his titles relate in a very direct way to the work's nature. Work No. 79: some Blu-tack kneaded, rolled into a ball and depressed against a wall (1993), for example, is just what it sounds like, as is Work No. 88, a sheet of A4 paper crumpled into a ball (1994). One of Creed's best known works is Work No. 200, half the air in a given space (1998), which is a room with enough inflated balloons in it for them to contain half the air in it.

In 1996, Richard Long and Roger Ackling selected Creed to exhibit at EASTinternational.

Creed's Work No 850, an athlete running through the Tate Britain gallery.

Creed is perhaps best known for his submission for the 2001 Turner Prize show at the Tate Gallery, Work No. 227, the lights going on and off, which won that year's prize. The artwork presented was an empty room in which the lights periodically switched on and off (frequency five seconds on/five seconds off). As so often with the Turner Prize, this created a great deal of press attention, most of it questioning whether something as minimalist as this could be considered art at all. Artist Jacqueline Crofton threw eggs at the walls of Creed's empty room as a protest against the prize, declaring that Creed's presentations were not real art and that "painting is in danger of becoming an extinct skill in this country". In 2006, Martin Creed presented an extensive exhibition with sculptures, videos and performances titled I Like Things with Nicola Trussardi Foundation in Milan.

Creed formed a band, Owada, in 1994. In 1997, they released their first CD, Nothing, on David Cunningham's Piano label. Here too there is a very direct relation between the song titles and the work itself: in songs like "1-2-3-4" the entire lyrics are contained in the title. Sound has also featured in his gallery-based work, with pieces using doorbells and metronomes. Since 1999, he no longer uses the band name "Owada. In 2000, he published a recording of his songs under his own name with the arts publisher Art Metropole, in Toronto. In 2010, he provided the cover art for a Futuristic Retro Champions single, while supporting its launch with an appearance with his own band.

In 2009, he wrote and choreographed Work No. 1020, a live performance of Creed's own music, ballet, words and film, originally produced by Sadler's Wells, London and performed in the Lilian Baylis Studio. In 2010, Work No. 1020 was performed at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh as part of the Fringe Festival and was most recently performed on 21st June 2011 in the main theatre at Sadler's Wells, London.

Some of Creed's works use neon signs. In these cases, the title of the work usually indicates what the sign says. These pieces include Work No. 220, Don't Worry (2000) and Work No. 232, the whole world + the work = the whole world (2000), which was mounted on Tate Britain in London.

In 2011, Creed gave work to the UK Registered Charity the Environmental Justice Foundation (1088128). A run of 20 t-shirts was made featuring his Work No. 531, all of which were hand screen printed in London and individually numbered on the inside neck. They are available from the charity.

Creed continues to exhibit work internationally and regularly plays live with his band.

Creed is reprented by Hauser & Wirth.

On art

"I don't know what art is"

"I wouldn't call myself an artist"

In an interview published in the book Art Now: Interviews with Modern Artists (2002), Creed explains that he used to 'make paintings' but never liked having to decide what to paint. He decided to stop making paintings and instead to think about what it meant, and why he wanted to make things. He says:

“

The only thing I feel like I know is that I want to make things. Other than that, I feel like I don’t know. So the problem is in trying to make something without knowing what I want. [...] I think it’s all to do with wanting to communicate. I mean, I think I want to make things because I want to communicate with people, because I want to be loved, because I want to express myself.

”

Creed says that he makes art works not as part of an academic exploration of 'conceptual' art, but rather from a wish to connect with people, 'wanting to communicate and wanting to say hello'. The work is therefore primarily emotional:

“

To me it’s emotional. Aye. To me that’s the starting point. I mean, I do it because I want to make something. I think that’s a desire, you know, or a need. I think that I recognise that I want to make something, and so I try to make something. But then you get to thinking about it and that’s where the problems start because you can’t help thinking about it, wondering whether it’s good or bad. But to me it’s emotional more than anything else.

”

Creed's work is often a small intervention in the world, making use of existing materials or situations rather than bringing new material into the world.

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2011

"Work no. 1059," Scotsman Steps, Edinburgh, Scotland

"Martin Creed: Works," MARCO, Vigo, Spain

"Things/Cosas," Sala Alcala 31, Madrid, Spain

"Martin Creed: Collected Works," Rennie Collection, Vancouver, Canada

"Sightings: Martin Creed," Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas TX

"Mothers," Hauser & Wirth, London, England

2010

"Martin Creed: Work No. 409," Southbank Centre Chorus Festival, London, England

"Down Over Up," Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, Scotland

"Ballet: Work No. 1020," (Part of Edinburgh Festival) Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, Scotland

The Common Guild, Glasgow, Scotland

2009

Hauser & Wirth, Zurich, Switzerland

Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Hiroshima, Japan (Travelling Exhibition)

"Work No. 975," Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh, Scotland

Artsonje Center, Seoul, Korea (Travelling Exhibition)

2008

Ikon Gallery, Birmingham, England (Travelling Exhibition)

2007

"Feelings," Hessel Museum of Art and CCS Galleries, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson NY

Hauser & Wirth Coppermill, London, England

2006

"I Like Things," Fondazione Nicola Trussardi, Milan, Italy

Hauser & Wirth Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland

"Martin Creed"s Variety Show," Tate Modern, London, England

2005

"Work No. 409," Ikon Gallery, Birmingham, England (Permanent Installation)

2004

Hauser & Wirth, London, England

"The whole world + the work = the whole world," Centre for Contemporary Art, Udjadowski Castle, Warsaw, Poland

2003

Kunsthalle Bern, Berne, Switzerland

"Work No. 289," The British School, Rome, Italy

2000

"Art Now: Martin Creed," Tate Britain, London, England

Selected Group Exhibitions

2012

"Artists Rooms," Tate Liverpool, Liverpool, England

2011

"ILLUMInations," Venice Biennale, Venice, Italy

"Open House," Singapore Biennale, Singapore

"Summer Collection Display," Tate St Ives, Cornwall, England

"8½: A Selection of works from the exhibitions organized by the Fondazione Nicola Trussardi from 2003 to the present," Stazione Leopolda, Florence, Italy

External links

• Martin Creed at Hauser & Wirth
• Martin Creed – Martin Creed's own website, with some artworks, texts and news
• Martin Creed at Johnen + Schöttle
• Artkrush.com interview with Martin Creed (April 2006)
• Martin Creed performance video from Tate Britain's website
• Martin Creed at Fondazione Nicola Trussardi
• Make me Reality Printed Words based on Work No.394 by Martin Creed
• Martin Creed at Tate St Ives Martin Creed's contribution to the summer show at Tate St Ives from the TateShots blog