Andrew Mania: Fine Art BA(Hons) graduate
BA(Hons) Fine Art 1994 - 1997
Andrew Mania studied Fine Art at Falmouth and went on to complete his MA at Chelsea College of Art in 1999. He has become known for his portraits featuring young, glamorous subjects that often stare directly back at the viewer. Surrounded by floral decorative elements, or with laser-like beams radiating from their faces, they evoke mystical qualities. Whether creating work through the act of drawing, collecting, sculptural assemblages or working with a video camera, Mania is concerned with the act of looking itself.
Andrew sums it up best himself: "I am like a collector of curiosities, or a cultural vagrant; sometimes recycling found images like old master drawings or photographs, then adding my own obsessions or dialogue. Yetis, UFOs, or birdlike swarms invade otherwise stable images. My work may be unsettling and odd, with an irreverent nostalgia for art history. The pictures seem to be going through a state of mischief. They form clusters, spills, columns or concentrations on the wall or more likely off the wall. I am interested in how pictures can be seen as passive or active props in a given space. Within these arrangements of collections and fragments a narrative is set up."
Mania has a distinctive relationship to art history - at times nostalgic, romantic and even irreverent. He appropriates the status of the classic which he proceeds to twist and distort in order to convey a fresh narrative. His is a visual language that is as genuinely idiosyncratic as it is enticing.
Prizes and Awards: Scholarship at the British School in Rome (2004), Jerwood Drawing Prize 2002, Pizza Express Drawing Prize (2001)
Solo exhibitions include: Galerie Diana Stigter, Amsterdam (2006), Vilma Gold Gallery, London (2006), John Connelly Presents, New York (2005), Jack Hanley Gallery, San Francisco (2005), Vilma Gold, London (2002), Bluecoat Gallery, Liverpool (2001).
Group exhibitions include: ROOM, Bristol (2005), Peter Kilchman Gallery, Zurich (2005), Peres Projects, Los Angeles (2005), Vilma Gold at Diana Stigter Amsterdam (2004), Wider Than The Sky, Commercial Street, London (2004), Collage, Bloomberg Space, London (2004), Inside Outside, Milton Keynes Gallery, (2004), Jerwood Drawing Prize, Jerwood Space, London (2003), Bloomberg New Contemporaries (2000).
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