Bryan Illsley
Painting Print
Artist Bryan Illsley’s diverse practice includes painting, sculpture, ceramics, design, print and jewellery. His emphasis on the ‘automatic’, on the spontaneous stroke, mark and gesture, gives his work a rare vitality and has built his reputation as a master of spontaneity in contemporary art.
Bryan Illsley was born in Surrey in 1937 and studied at Kingston School of Art in the 1950s. In 1963 he moved to St Ives and worked at the Leach Pottery, before establishing a partnership with Breon O'Casey making studio jewellery in 1967. Having exhibited in West Cornwall and been a member of the Penwith Society, he now lives in London. His work features extensively in public collections, including those of the Victoria and Albert Museum London, the Arts Council, Crafts Council, Contemporary Arts Society, Kettles Yard Cambridge and the Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto.
Selected Exhibitions:
2015 Collect, with Contemporary Applied Arts, Saatchi Gallery, London;
2014 Fun and Games, Marsden Woo Gallery, London;
2012 Collect, with Contemporary Applied Arts, Saatchi Gallery, London;
2011 Lemon Street Gallery, Truro;
2010 Partings and Pipelines, Marsden Woo Gallery, London;
2009 Selected Works, Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea;
2008 Bryan Illsley: New Prints and Recent Paintings, Cross Street Gallery, London;
2008 The work of Bryan Illsley, selected by Stella Benjamin, The Anthony Shaw Collection, London;
2004 Group exhibition (ceramics), Barrett Marsden Gallery, London;
1999 Illsley (paintings) and Robert Marsden (metalwork), Barrett Marsden Gallery, London;
1999 Todd Gallery, London (paintings);
1998 Inaugural exhibition, Barrett Marsden Gallery, London;
1995 Pandora’s Box (ceramics), Crafts Council, London;
1993 The Raw and The Cooked (ceramics), Museum of Modern Art, Oxford;
1993 Sculpture Aspen, Residency, Aspen Art Museum, Colorado, USA;
1992 Sculptures and Paintings, Workshop Gallery, Cirencester;
1990 Chiltern Sculpture Trail, Oxford Residency;
1990 Recent Works, Jamison/Thomas Gallery, Portland, Oregon, USA.
