Richard Wentworth

Richard Wentworth has been a prominent figure in New British Sculpture since the late 1970s.

Biography of Richard Wentworth

Richard Wentworth was born in Samoa in 1947. He pursued his art education at Hornsey College of Art in North London starting from 1965 and later continued his studies at the Royal College of Art (1966-1970). In 1967, he worked for Henry Moore.

Since the early 1970s, Wentworth has been working on his ongoing photographic series,  "Making Do and Getting By."  

From 1971 to 1987, Wentworth worked as a tutor at Goldsmith's College, the University of London. During the early 1980s, Wentworth became associated with the New British Sculpture movement.

During 2002-2010, he was a Ruskin Master of Drawing at Ruskin School of Art in Oxford. Additionally, Wentworth held the position of Professor of Sculpture at the Royal College of Art for two years, from 2009 to 2011. 

In 2011, Richard Wentworth was awarded the Commander of the Order of the British Empire.

His recent solo shows include "False Ceiling" at Istanbul Modern (2023), "Lecciones Aprendidas" at NoguerasBlanchard in Madrid (2019), "Concertina" at Arebyte Gallery in London (2017), "Richard Wentworth at Maison Alaïa" at Galerie Azzedine Alaïa in Paris (2017), and many more. 

Wentworth's works have been featured in group exhibitions, including "Behold - A Show About Touch" at Hypha Studios in London (2023), "Eternally Yours" at Somerset House in London (2022), "Carl Plackman and His Circle" at Pangolin in London (2019), "The Everyday and Extraordinary" at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery in Birmingham (2018), among others.  

Currently, the artist resides in London, UK.

Richard Wentworth's Art Style

His work revolves around the concept of objects and their integration into our daily lives, reshaping the traditional definitions of both sculpture and photography. By repurposing industrial or found objects into artistic creations, Wentworth challenges their original functions and expands our perception of them by defying conventional categorization.

His sculptural compositions toy with the idea of ready-made art and the juxtaposition of unrelated objects. Meanwhile, in his ongoing photography series "Making Do and Getting By," Wentworth meticulously documents the mundane, capturing objects, sporadic geometries, and uncanny situations that often escape notice.