Artist Spotlight
Ashley Bickerton rose to prominence in the mid-1980s with a succession of ironic, abstracted constructions focused on questions of consumerism and identity. Since relocating to the Indonesian island of Bali in the early 1990s, he has explored cultural dislocation in paintings and sculptures with an ornate, handcrafted aesthetic, the works’ elaborate styling and tongue-in-cheek feel contrasting sharply with the conceptual detachment of his previous output. In more recent years, Bickerton has brought his practice full circle, addressing the exploitation and enduring power of nature in the face of technology.
Launched in 2020, Artist Spotlight is presented once a month as a regular part of the gallery’s programming. Each Artist Spotlight highlights a work by an individual artist—made available exclusively online for forty-eight hours—together with new editorial features and selected archival content.
Artist Spotlight: Ashley Bickerton features a new three-dimensional work by the artist. Kara Vander Weg, senior director of Gagosian, commented, “Ashley has been forthcoming about the fact that he was diagnosed with ALS over a year ago. And despite the incredible challenges that come with the disease, he has remained focused on making and exhibiting his art. We are proud to present this sculpture as part of our Artist Spotlight series. Proceeds from the sale will be contributed to the ALS Association global research and advocacy fund.”
For more information, please contact the gallery at collecting@gagosian.com.
#GagosianSpotlight
Photo: courtesy Bickerton Studio
The Importance of Elsewhere: on Ashley Bickerton
This documentary film includes footage of Ashley Bickerton as he gives a tour of his Bali studio during his final year, as well as interviews with artists Matthew Barney, Mark Dion, Damien Hirst, Jamian Juliano-Villani, Jon Kessler, and writer Paul Theroux.
Now available
Gagosian Quarterly Spring 2023
The Spring 2023 issue of Gagosian Quarterly is now available, featuring Roe Ethridge’s Two Kittens with Yarn Ball (2017–22) on its cover.
Game Changer
Ashley Bickerton
Michael Slenske pays tribute to the life and work of artist Ashley Bickerton.
Bickerton’s “Bickertons” in the Realm of the Fetish
Abigail Solomon-Godeau analyzes periodization, artistic persona, and fetishism in the expansive work of Ashley Bickerton.
Truth Revealed: Damien Hirst and James Fox on Ashley Bickerton
In conversation with James Fox, Damien Hirst reflects on the artwork of his longtime friend.
Related News
New Representation
Ashley Bickerton
Gagosian is pleased to announce the gallery’s representation of Ashley Bickerton. The artist’s first solo exhibition with the gallery is scheduled for 2023 at Gagosian New York.
Originally identified with the Neo-Geo tendency of the late-1980s scene in New York, Bickerton made his name with ironic, abstracted constructions focused on ideas of consumerism, identity, and value. When Bickerton relocated permanently to the Indonesian island of Bali in 1993, his work took a self-consciously “exotic” turn. Its tongue-in-cheek feel and ornate, crafted look contrast sharply with the conceptual detachment of his previous output, though a slippage between mediums, genres, and subjects remained. Over the past few years, Bickerton has brought his practice full circle, synthesizing its heterogeneous modes and gestures into an all-encompassing visual language.
Photo: courtesy Bickerton Studio
Video
Ashley Bickerton
Bali Studio Tour
Leading a virtual tour of his oceanside studio in Uluwatu, Bali, Indonesia, in March 2021, Ashley Bickerton offers a peek at his studio space, recent works, and the tropical grounds of the property.
Still from “Ashley Bickerton: Bali Studio Tour”
Art Fair
Art Basel Hong Kong 2024
March 27–30, 2024
Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre
www.artbasel.com
Gagosian is participating in Art Basel Hong Kong 2024 with a selection of works by international contemporary artists. The works on view, which embrace a dizzying variety of subjects and approaches, see the participating artists identify fresh ways to disrupt established histories of abstraction and figuration, and instill sculptural and painterly representations of the natural world with complex cultural significance.
Sarah Sze, Turning and Turning, 2024 © Sarah Sze. Photo: Maris Hutchinson
Museum Exhibitions
Closed
The Greek Gift
June 22–October 31, 2021
DESTE Foundation Project Space, Slaughterhouse, Hydra, Greece
deste.gr
Coordinated by Massimiliano Gioni, this exhibition brings together a series of new and existing works alongside found objects and impromptu responses from a variety of artists who have maintained decades-long relationships with Dakis Joannou and the DESTE Foundation. Part divertissement and part collaborative project, the exhibition borrows its title from a chess tactic—the “Greek gift sacrifice.” Installed in the small, cavernous spaces of the Slaughterhouse, the works sit side by side like toys in a dollhouse. Work by Ashley Bickerton, Urs Fischer, and Christopher Wool is included.
Ashley Bickerton, Ocean Chunk: Indian Ocean/Aegean Sea, 2021, installation view, DESTE Foundation Project Space, Slaughterhouse, Hydra, Greece © Ashley Bickerton. Photo: Paris Tavitian
Closed
Ashley Bickerton in
Emerald City
March 28–May 31, 2018
chi art space and K11 Art Foundation Pop-up Space, Hong Kong
www.k11artfoundation.org
Beginning with basic geometric concepts that represent spatial relations, Emerald City examines the structures and meanings of the cosmos, land, and sea, architectural environments, the human body, and other physical and abstract spaces to shed light on the stories of cultural coexistence amid globalization. Bringing together works of contemporary art including paintings, videos, sculptures, and site-specific installations, the exhibition demonstrates how geometry shapes our conception of the world, while also inspiring us to look at the world outside the confines of geometric thinking. Work by Ashley Bickerton is included.
Installation view, Emerald City, K11 Art Foundation Pop-up Space, Hong Kong, March 28–April 22, 2018. Artwork, front: © Carl F. Cheng; back left and back right: © Ashley Bickerton; back middle: © Nik Kosmas. Photo: courtesy K11 Art Foundation
Closed
Brand New
Art and Commodity in the 1980s
February 14–May 13, 2018
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC
hirshhorn.si.edu
Brand New focuses on the 1980s as the iconic decade when artwork became a commodity and the artist, a brand. This exhibition of nearly 150 works examines the origins and rise of a new generation of artists in New York who blurred the lines between art, entertainment, and commerce—a shift that continues to define contemporary art today. Work by Ashley Bickerton, Richard Prince, and Andy Warhol is included.
Ashley Bickerton, Tormented Self-Portrait (Susie at Arles) #2, 1988 © Ashley Bickerton
Closed
Ashley Bickerton
September 23–December 16, 2017
FLAG Art Foundation, New York
www.flagartfoundation.org
Ashley Bickerton’s vibrant and often dystopic vision of contemporary culture has been at the center of his four-decade-long practice, which includes painting, photography, sculpture, and every possible combination therein. This survey, the artist’s first in the United States, demonstrates the visual range of Bickerton’s oeuvre, which oscillates between playfulness and brutality, extreme beauty and the grotesque. Works from the artist’s signature series from the 1980s to the present, including Susie, Logos, Blue Man, Water Vector, and Wall-Wall, highlight his subversive and self-aware critique of identity, consumerism, and cultural artifice.
Installation view, Ashley Bickerton, FLAG Art Foundation, New York, September 23–December 16, 2017. Artwork © Ashley Bickerton. Photo: Steven Probert