James O'Dwyer

For me painting is performative :: explore - form - redact - scribe - obliterate - order - resolve.

The materiality of paint texture, gesture, and colour - the abstract gestalt - a record of process, a layered palimpsest, manifested in the artefact.

I work using an iterative process, beginning from the discoveries of previous work, but letting go of predetermined expectations. Taking an experimental approach to working with painting media, including the use of a plasterer’s trowel, squeegee, metal scribe and occasionally brush, to allow chance and visual discovery to inform the dynamic journey a painting takes.

I am a Irish/British artist from London, and since leaving there in 1997, I have lived in Malmo Sweden, in Newcastle, and currently reside in Bristol where I have a family and teach alongside of my studio practice. Importantly for me it is the experience of these cities and of their hinter-landscapes that informs my work.

Alongside of my establishing and leading a foundation art & design programme, I exhibit widely in the UK, and my work is held in collections in the U.K., Europe, the UAE, and in the U.S.

In 2022/3 I took a sabbatical from teaching and using this time and intellectual space to fully engage with an i...

University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne MA
Erasmus Scholar: Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet, Sweden.

Motley Theatre Design Riverside Hammersmith. Postgraduate Theatre Design

Harrow School of Art (University of Westminster, London) BA Hons 1:1

(PGCE UWE 2009)

Bristol & Bath:
2024 HRE Contemporary Bristol - Group Show
Equinox Bristol Gallery Weekend
2022 RWA Open - Friends selection
2022 CassArt Solo show
Hamilton House Open Studio
2014 Hamilton House, Bristol. group show.
2013 RWA OPEN.
2011 Milsom Place, Bath group.
2009 Paintworks, Bristol group. Severnshed, solo.
2008 Hotwells Gallery, group.
2007 Drawing installation for Station, Bristol.
2005 ALLOY Centrespace Gallery, group.
2003 ‘RETOX’ festival with Jamaica Street Artists.
2001-8 Open Studios at Jamaica Street Artists.

SCA Papers award in 2003,
2005 showcase artist in ‘FIVE’ arts magazine

Previous exhibitions in London include:
Slaughterhouse Gallery, group.
Shad Thames Gallery, solo.
Whitechapel Open Studios.