Mike Perry: Artist Talk

The event takes place onsite in the Taylorian Lecture Theatre, next to the Ashmolean Museum, and the online event via Zoom. Booking is essential.

With artist Mike Perry.

Artists were once in awe of nature and interested in the formal beauty of the landscape. But today, the threat of climate change and species extinction has changed the way artists engage with the natural world.

Mike Perry, who lives and works in Pembrokeshire, is a contemporary artist who examines interactions of landscapes, nature and industrial society, questioning the romantic mythology of Britain's wild places.

Perry’s work engages with how we look at and interpret our rural landscapes, challenging the idea of our national parks as areas of wilderness and natural beauty.

His work is distinct in the hyperlocal and apparently mundane nature of his subjects. Rather than epic, aerial vistas of glaciers or oil fields, Perry directs our attention to the overlooked hedgerow or the shell-incrusted plastic flip-flop found whilst beach-combing in West Wales. The drama of Perry's micro-studies are nonetheless global, holding a tension between their extraordinary aesthetic beauty and the damage inflicted upon nature by human activity.

In this talk, Perry will discuss his artistic process and selected works he has made over the last 20 years. He will talk about the challenge of finding beauty and hope in a threatened landscape. At a time of ecological collapse and climate change, his work could hardly be more resonant.