Colin Self felt a kinship with British Pop artists during the 1960s but is of the opinion that their work was generally a celebration of modern mass culture whereas his own art was much darker in mood. ‘Pop artists embraced Materialism’, he recalls. ‘I didn’t’.
As he explained in his statement for the São Paolo biennale in 1971, however, ‘Much of my work has been in connection with the common object, seeing that every object contains as much personality, presence and individuality as a person’.
Among the most haunting of his early pictures are those of ordinary armchairs and sofas, sometimes accompanied by figures, drawn with great intensity and often unnerving in their extreme perspectives and spatial distortion. Other series were devoted to the hot dog - that-all-American food which he described in 1965 as being ‘as important a 20th century development as (say) a rocker’ - to the quintessential modern architecture of cinema interiors, and to the trappings of fashion.
Public collections include
Arts Council of Great Britain, London
Museum of Modern Art, New York
Pallant House, Chichester
Tate Gallery, London
Solo Exhibitions
2015, Colin Self: Streetseen, Hearts and Glances, Mayor Gallery, London
2008, Colin Self - Art in the Nuclear Age, Pallant House Gallery, Chichester, West Sussex
2006, Collage, The Mayor Gallery, London
1996/95, The Tate Gallery, London
1986, Colin Self's Colin Selfs, The ICA, London
1975, Norwich School of Art, Norwich
1968, Galerie Hans Neuendorf, Hamburg Alecto Gallery, London
1966, Galerie Yvon Lambert, Paris
1965, Piccadilly Gallery, London
Group Exhibitions
2017, Three Wise Men: Anthony Donaldson - Patrick O'Reilly - Colin Self, The Mayor Gallery, London
2013, When Britain went Pop! British Pop Art: The Early Years, Christie's Mayfair, London; The New Situation; Art in London in the Sixties, Sotheby’s, London
2008, POP und die Folgen, Museum der Stadt Ratingen, Ratingen
2006, Art & the 60s from Tate Britain, Auckland Art Gallery, Auckland
2006/05, British Pop, Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, Bilbao
2004, Art & the 60's: This was Tomorrow, Birmingham Museums & Art Gallery, Birmingham; Living Dust, Norwich Gallery, Norwich; Pop Art UK - British Pop Art 1956-1972, Galleria Civica di Modena, Modena
1999, Pop Impressions, Museum of Modern Art, New York
1998, Signature Pieces, Alan Cristea Gallery, London
1996, Norwich Castle Museum, Norwich; Independent Gallery, London; Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Santa Barbara; Imperial War Museum, London
1995, Whitford Fine Art, London
1992, Royal Academy of Arts, London
1991, Royal Academy of Arts, London; Ludwig Museum, Cologne; Montreal Museum of Arts, Montreal
1990, Fine Art Society, London
1989, University of East Anglia, Norwich
1987, ICA Gallery, London
1984, Tate Gallery, London
1983, Bernard Jacobson Gallery, London
1982, Tate Gallery, London
1981, Royal Academy of Arts, London
1980, Angela Flowers Gallery, London
1980/79, Gimpel Fils Gallery, London
1978/76, Victoria and Albert Museum, London
1976/75, Hayward Gallery
1971, Museum of Modern Art, New York; Arthur Tooth and Sons, London; ICA, London
1970, Castle Museum, Norwich; Musée d'art Moderne, Paris; Museum of Modern Art, New York
1969, Gimpels Gallery, New York; Hayward Gallery, London; ICA Gallery, London; Jewish Museum, New York
1968, Gallerie Milano, Milan; Bradford City Art and Museum, Bradford; Bear Lane Gallery, Oxford; Musée d'Art Moderne, Paris