Scotland and Venice Biennale

Charles Avery

Working across a range of media, Avery's art is characterised by formal beauty, humour and a spirit of philosophical enquiry, and is influenced by the work of (among others) William Blake, PG Woodehouse, Jorge Luis Borges, Joseph Beuys and Joseph Kosuth.

Avery's most high profile piece to date is the epic Islanders project, in which over a ten year period he has described the topology and cosmology of an imaginary island inspired by his childhood on the Inner Hebrides.

The latest chapter in the project, The Plane of the Gods, shown at the Cubitt Gallery, London in 2006, features large-scale drawings, models, diagrams and texts.

On completion of the Islanders project Avery intends to publish the work within several large, leather-bound encyclopaedic volumes.

As a result of becoming one of four finalists in the 2002-2003 edition of the Award for Young Italian Art, Avery's work was shown at the Venice Biennale of Art in 2003. A panel of judges selected four artists out of 402 participants who presented a proposal for an original work for the collection of the new National Museum of the Arts of the 21st Century.

Commenting on Avery's work the judges said: '[His] complex research is remarkable for its inventive capacity and intellectual rigour and it pivots on the masterly uses of drawing, also in its variety of expressive forms.'

The work - an installation created with paintings, drawings, poems and a table made up from a sheet of steel on which a tetrahedron is laid - was shown in the Padiglione Venezia in the Biennale Gardens.

In 2004 and 2006 Avery was nominated for the Jerwood Drawing Prize.

Other recent projects and exhibitions include (In 2006) Exhibition of new work (with Keith Wilson), Alexandre Polazzon, London; Solo exhibition at Galleria S.A.L.E.S., Rome (In 2005) The islanders: an introduction, doggerfisher, Edinburgh; Hunting the Noumenon (Solo exhibition), Galleria Archimede Staffolini, Cyprus; Theoroma (Group Exhibition) Musee d'Art Contemporain, Avigon, France (In 2004) It thinks (Solo exhibition) Galleria Sonia Rosso, Turin; The Hunter (Solo exhibition) and Trailer (Group exhibition), Man in the Holocene, London; Premio del Golfo (Group exhibition), La Spezia, Italy.

Avery is represented by:

doggerfisher/Susanna Beaumont
11 Gayfield Square
Edinburgh EH1 3NT
Tel: +44(0)131 558 7110
www.doggerfisher.com

Galleria Sonia Rosso
via Giulia di Barolo 11/H,
Turin 10124
Italy
Tel: +39 (0)11 8172478

Galeria S.A.L.E.S, Rome.

For examples of his work visit the doggerfisher website