Bluecoat is delighted to welcome an exhibition by critically acclaimed interdisciplinary artist Tim Spooner this autumn.
Spooner works across a range of disciplines to create often unpredictable and distinctive work. In A New Kind of Animal he brings an exciting new commission to the Bluecoat, in the form of a host of furry, quivering animatronic sculptures. On display alongside this new commission will be an impressive body of Spooner’s previous work, including over 190 works in collage, painting, sculpture and objects used in performances over the past 15 years.
A New Kind of Animal is a national touring exhibition co-commissioned by Southwark Park Galleries, London and Bluecoat, Liverpool.
Spooner says “I’ve been looking back at a large quantity of existing work: shuffling, filtering and reordering it, looking for undercurrents and patterns. The resulting single, long sequence of old work will serve as a blueprint for the new work at the Bluecoat, a set of instructions for a new kind of animal.”
Spooner’s idiosyncratic work uses materials and objects in ways that reveal unexpected properties. As he has described: “I am interested in ways we try to explain the world: metaphysics and creation myths. My own approach to the mystery is to experiment with how materials behave, to get a better understanding of them. From these I construct collections of sculptures and objects which come together into ideas for possible universes.”
Adam Smythe-Lewis, Senior Curator at the Bluecoat, says “We are thrilled to welcome Tim Spooner and bring his compelling work to our gallery and to North West audiences. It has been wonderful to watch the process as Tim’s intriguing ideas take shape in A New Kind of Animal, and to work with Southwark Park Galleries on the development of this new commission.”
The exhibition runs at Southwark Park Galleries from 15 July – 24 September 2023 before opening at the Bluecoat on Friday 6th October.