Keith Piper (artist)
Encyclopedia
BLK Art Group
The BLK Art Group was the name chosen in 1982 by a group of four influential conceptual artists, painters, sculptors and installation artists based in the United Kingdom...
, an association of black British art students, mostly based in the West Midlands
West Midlands (region)
The West Midlands is an official region of England, covering the western half of the area traditionally known as the Midlands. It contains the second most populous British city, Birmingham, and the larger West Midlands conurbation, which includes the city of Wolverhampton and large towns of Dudley,...
region of the UK. His work explores multi-media elements such as tape/slide, sound and video within an Installation based practice. More recently Piper has been incorporating CD-Rom and Web sites into his work.
Born in Malta
Malta
Malta , officially known as the Republic of Malta , is a Southern European country consisting of an archipelago situated in the centre of the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya, with Gibraltar to the west and Alexandria to the east.Malta covers just over in...
to a working-class family of Caribbean descent and raised in and around Birmingham
Birmingham
Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...
, Piper was first attracted to art as a response to the industrialized landscape of his childhood. While a student at Trent Polytechnic, Piper joined artist and art historian Eddie Chambers, as well as other artists to form The BLK Art Group. These artists sought to explore issues relevant to aspects of black political struggles, both in Britain and internationally. Piper went on to study at the Royal College of Art
Royal College of Art
The Royal College of Art is an art school located in London, United Kingdom. It is the world’s only wholly postgraduate university of art and design, offering the degrees of Master of Arts , Master of Philosophy and Doctor of Philosophy...
in London. Piper also works to develop black British artists.
His work is held in the collections of the Tate
Tate
-Places:*Tate, Georgia, a town in the United States*Tate County, Mississippi, a county in the United States*Táté, the Hungarian name for Totoi village, Sântimbru Commune, Alba County, Romania*Tate, Filipino word for States...
and the Manchester Art Gallery
Manchester Art Gallery
Manchester Art Gallery is a publicly-owned art gallery in Manchester, England. It was formerly known as Manchester City Art Gallery.The gallery was opened in 1824 and today occupies three buildings, the oldest of which - designed by Sir Charles Barry - is Grade I listed and was originally home to...
.
Selected Multimedia Installations and Projects
- A Fictional Tourist in Europe, 2001
- The Mechanoid’s Bloodline, 2001
- The Exploded City, 1998
- Four Frontiers, 1998
- Message Carrier, 1998
- Robot Bodies, 1998
- Relocating the Remains, 1997
- The Fictions of Science, 1996
- Four Corners, A Contest of Opposites, 1995
- Reckless Eyeballing, 1995
- Terrible Spaces, 1994
- Exotic Signs, 1993
- Transgressive Acts, 1993
- Another Step into the Arena, 1992
- Tagging the Other, 1992
- Trade Winds, 1992
- A Ship Called Jesus, 1991
- Step into the Arena, 1991
- The Devil Finds Work, 1990
- Chanting Heads, 1988