Paul Newman
Paul Newman’s current body of work, English Gothic, combines 18th – 21st century motifs including, historical landscape painting, architecture, classic monsters of movies such as the Fly and Frankenstein, and even the Ford Escort van.
With sources ranging from artist books and postcards, film stills, and urban walking, the series explores shifting architectural markers of progress and dereliction in our landscape, relating to depictions in art history. Stirred into the mix are the various depictions of the monster, developed from a performative thread which in turn taps into memories growing up with horror films and wearing monster masks in front of the mirror. The cocktail of narratives stitched together within the work are open to interpretations, with a tonal sensibility ranging from the melancholy to the absurd.
Paul Newman lives and works in Birmingham. Exhibitions include Contemporary Masters from Britain in a five museum touring show in China (2017) and Stage (2015) a solo show at mac Birmingham. Paul curates a side project called Monster Club. He is represented by Aleph Contemporary and is a visiting lecturer at Birmingham School of Art & and Loughborough University.