Robert Montgomery
BIOGRAPHY
United Kingdom, b. 1972
Montgomery is a British contemporary artist well known for his work in public space and guerilla billboard poems. He makes billboard poems, light works, fire poems, woodcuts, paintings and watercolours. His work brings text art closer to the language of poetry. He represented the UK in the 2012 Kochi Biennale and the 2016 Yinchuan Biennale. His work is in museum collections across the world including the Albright Knox in New York, and the Museum of Fine Arts Houston. He has had solo museum projects at the Aspen Art Museum in Colorado, Oklahoma Contemporary in Oklahoma City, and the Cer Modern Museum in Ankara. His work is hugely popular on the internet, the piece “The People You Love Become Ghosts Inside of You” has been shared online more than 200 million times.
Andy Warhol’s Interview magazine says about Montgomery,
“The poems he composes suggest a steady faith that humanity can heal the ecological and emotional trauma of our times, with a lyricism that recalls poets like Philip Larkin and Sylvia Plath. Montgomery’s focus lies in broadcasting his message to a wider audience. His preferred installation format is co-opted billboards: his own text, replacing the billboards’, subverts their intended purpose of disseminating ads. Montgomery’s art has graced the cityscapes of Paris, Berlin, and London, where he is based. His first solo exhibition in New York opened last week at C24 Gallery, comprising the largest collection of his works gathered together to date. We visited Montgomery at C24 gallery while he was installing, starting the interview with a tour. Walking in the entrance with blaring words of lights ahead and on either side felt like entering a cathedral…”
Montgomery currently lives and works in London.
EDUCATION
BA, Edinburgh College of Art, Edinburgh, Scotland
MFA, Edinburgh College of Art, Edinburgh, Scotland
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2022
The Future Is An Invisible Playground, Madison Gallery, Solana Beach, CA
Power! Light! The Kunstmuseum Wolsburge, Germany
Urbain.es, La Condition Publique, Roubaix, France
2021
Salvage Paradise Danysz Gallery Paris
2020
The Sea has No Name For America , Madison Gallery, Solana Beach, CA
2019
Shiny Colorful Amusements for the Walls of the Bourgeoisie, JD Malat Gallery, London
2018
The City in Their Echo, Aspen Art Museum, Aspen, CO
2018
New Generation, Madison Gallery, Solana Beach, CA
2017
Hammersmith Poem and Love Letters to Kazimir Malevich, Cob, London
2016
Light As Poetry, Madison Gallery, La Jolla, CA
2015
SELECT New York, C24 Gallery, New York, NY USA
ISTANBUL’74, Istanbul, Turkey
People You Love (Installation for National Poetry Day), The Southbank Centre, London
Bodies Burning at the Edges, LeRoy Neiman Gallery, Columbia University, New York
2014
Robert Montgomery, Anna Jill Lupertz Gallery, Berlin, Germany
The office Gallery, Nicosia, Cyprus
2013
Robert Montgomery, C24 Gallery, New York, NY, USA
2012
Robert Montgomery: Echoes of Voices in the High Towers Part 2, Neue Berliner Räume, Stattbad Wedding, and billboard sites, Berlin Germany
Robert Montgomery: Echoes of Voices in the High Towers Part 2, Neue Berliner Räume, site of old Tempelhof Airport and billboard sites, Berlin, Germany
Whenever An Angel, Galerie Analix-Forever, Geneva, Switzerland
It Turned Out This Way Cos You Dreamed It This Way, KK Outlet and billboard sites, London, United Kingdom
2011
Fire of Each Other, Galerie Nuke, Paris, France
2009
Emotional Emergency, Analix Forever Gallery, Geneva, Switzerland
2008
Derniers Jours: May 68/May 08, Galerie Nuke, Paris France
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2018
Robert Montgomery: Estuary Poen for Wyndham Lewis and Other Works, Canary Wharf, London
2017
The Power Club, Cob, London
2015
All Rise, Public Installation, Seattle, WA
The Crayon Miscellany, OMI International Arts Center, C24 Gallery, Ghent, NY
PULSE New York, C24 Gallery, New York, NY USA
Searock Songlines, Public Project, Leogang, Australia
Sunday in the Park with Ed, Display Gallery, London
2014
Fields of Vision, Grand Depart Tour de France, Yorkshire Festival, England
Ian Hamilton Finlay, Robert Montgomery and Lawrence Weiner, AJL Art, Berlin, Germany
Cutlog, Public Installation, New York, NY
2013
Art St Barth, Valentine de Badereau Gallery, St Barths
2012
The Kochi-Muziris Biennale, Fort Kochi, Kerala, India
Preposterous, La Scatola Gallery, London, United Kingdom
Le Printemps de Septembre, curated by Paul Ardenne, Toulouse, France
From The Age of The Poets, Aanat & Zoo, Berlin, Germany
Sublime · Kursiv, Anna Jill Lupertz Gallery at Epicentro Art, Berlin, Germany Noir Clair, curated by Barbara Polla and Victor de Bonnecaze, Galerie Vanessa Quang, Paris, France
Wealth, Mass Gallery, London, United Kingdom
Oneliners, KOP, Breda, The Netherlands
A Gathering, curated by Maria-Thalia Carras & Olga Hatzidaki, Athens Festival, Athens, Greece
Art St Barth, Valentine de Badereau Gallery, St Barths
2011
And Like This You Keep Them Alive/On Love, Neue Berliner Räume. Berlin, Germany
All Palaces Are Temporary Palaces, Courtyard of the Palais de Tokyo Paris, France
The Streets Belong to No One, Truck on the streets of the Galata neighborhood. Casa dell Arte Project collateral to the 12th Istanbul Biennale, Istanbul, Turkey
All Palaces Are Temporary Palaces, Lyon Docks, Docks Art Fair Program, Lyon, France
Orientale*, curated by Maurizio Bortolotti and Shwetal Patel, collateral to the 54th
Venice Biennale. Chiesa delle Zitelle, Venice, Italy
Royal Wedding Poem (gesso panel version), Scope Foundation Project with Galerie
Analix-Forever, Scope Art Basel, Basel, Switzerland
Royal Wedding Poems, Billboard series, London, United Kingdom
Génération Polluée, Galerie Nuke, Paris, France
2010
Trees, Galerie Analix-Forever, Geneva, Switzerland
Heart of Glass, 20 Hoxton Square Projects, London, United Kingdom
The People You Love Become Ghosts Inside of You. Scope Foundation Project with
Galerie Analix-Forever, Scope Art Basel, Basel, Switzerland
I Won’t Give Up, Coningsby Gallery, London, United Kingdom Cars & Bikes, Galerie Analix-Forever, Geneva, Switzerland Don’t Jump, Galerie Bigger Better Space, Vienna, Austria
The People You Love Become Ghosts Inside of You, The De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill, United Kingdom
2009
Words in the City at Night, Billboard Series. London, United Kingdom
Utopia/Distopia, The Grand Palais, Art Paris Program, Paris, France
Learning by Doing: 25 Years of Artist’s in Residence at the MFAH, Museum of Fine
Arts, Houston, TX, United States
2008
I Won’t Give Up, Guido Costa Projects, Turin, Italy
2007
Strategic Art Getts, curated by Neil Mulholland. The Embassy Gallery, Edinburgh, Scotland
Daze & Confused versus Andy Warhol, The BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Newcastle-Gateshead, United Kingdom
2006
The Circle of Dead Grass Where the Circus Used to Be, Trolley Gallery, London, United Kingdom
2005
God is Bored of Us., Fast Moving Consumer Goods, London, United Kingdom
Words in the City at Night, London, United Kingdom
PERMANENT COLLECTIONS
Albright Knox Museum, Buffalo, New York. USA Cass Sculpture Foundation, Chichester, UK Manja Gideon Collection, Geneva, Switzerland Florence Welch Collection, London
Michael Stipe Collection, New York, USA
Wassner Collection, New York, USA
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, USA
Edinburgh Art Festival Collection, Edinburgh, UK
LVMH Collection. Work on permanent display at Dior Homme space, Soho, New York, USA Henrik Wobbe Collection, Hamburg, Germany
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Yinchuan, China Benoit Pierre Emery Collection, Paris, France
Collection of Patrick Van Ommeslaeghe, Antwerp, Belgium Charlie and Elizabeth Cetin Collection, London, UK
Gianni and Michael Alen-Buckley Collection, London,
UK Municipal Collection Saalfelden Leogang, Salzburg, Austria Artshare Collection, Los Angeles, USA
Luepertz Collection, Berlin, Germany
Jacques Esseberg Collection, Paris and St Tropez, France
Dick Institute Collection, Scotland, UK
Casa dell Arte Collection, Bodrum, Turkey
Albright Knox Museum, New York, USA
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
“Echoes of Voices in the High Towers” monograph. Published by Mono Kultur, 2012, Berlin, Germany
“Robert Montgomery Brings His Word Art to the Billboards of Berlin” Susanna Davies- Crook, Exberliner magazine, July/August 2012
“Signs of the Times” Audrey Gillian, The Scotsman Magazine, 23 June 2012
“Robert Montgomery” Vinyl Riot Magazine, Spring 2012.
“The Artist Vandalising Advertising With Poetry” Matilda Battersby, The Independent, February 3rd 2012
“Fire of Each Other” monograph, published by Nuke Editions, 2011. Paris, France
“Robert Montgomery” by Olivier Zahm. Purple Magazine, Fall/Winter 2011. Vol. III issue 16, Paris, France
“The Don Draper With Soul”. Interview with Laura Havlin for Phaidon. October 2011 “Robert Montgomery- Social Distortion” by Sven Fortmann. Lodown Magazine issue 78, October 2011, Berlin, Germany
“Collective 1984-2009”. by Kate Gray and Neil Mulholland. published by Revolver and the
Collective Gallery. 2011. ISBN-10: 3868950338
“Ghost in the Machine” interview with John Paul Pryor for Dazed & Confused. May 2011 “Robert Montgomery, The Circle of Dead Grass Where the Circus Used to Be” SOME/THINGS MAGAZINE, issue 2. Paris, 2010.
“Street Art” by Francesca Gavin. Dazed & Confused Japan. April issue 2009.
“Robert Montgomery, Whenever You See the Sun Reflected in the Window of a Building it is an Angel” SOME/THINGS MAGAZINE, issue 1. Paris, France, 2009
“Core Artists and Critics in Residence” published by the Museum of Fine Arts Houston,
2008. ISBN: 9780890901625
“Robert Montgomery, Derniers Jours. Paris May 68/08” exhibition catalogue published by
Nuke Editions, texts by Jerome Sans and David Dorrell. 2008
“I Won’t Give Up” Robert Montgomery & Fabio Paleari, published by Damiani, 2008
ISBN:9788862080194
“Robert Montgomery at Inman” by Frances Colpitt. Art in America, Vol. 85, No.9
