Liam Gillick

Liam Gillick (b. 1964, Aylesbury, United Kingdom) lives and works in New York. His practice encompasses sculpture, installation, architecture, film, video, drawing, design, writing, and exhibition-making. Since the late 1980s, Gillick has developed a multidisciplinary practice concerned with the social, political, and economic structures that shape contemporary life. His work frequently examines labour, production, time, organisation, negotiation, and the systems through which social relations are constructed and maintained. Gillick studied at Hertfordshire College of Art from 1983 to 1984 before completing a BA in Fine Art at Goldsmiths College, University of London, in 1987. His work developed during a period of significant transformation in British contemporary art, and he became known for sculptures and installations that combine geometric forms, industrial materials, text, colour, and architectural structures. Rather than treating sculpture as an autonomous object, Gillick frequently uses it to create situations in which questions of social organisation, communication, and collective behaviour can be considered. His practice also extends into writing, theoretical research, lectures, and curatorial projects. A recurring concern in Gillick’s work is the relationship between the physical structures of the built environment and the less visible systems that organise contemporary society. His sculptures and installations often employ aluminium, Plexiglas, glass, and other industrial materials, while his texts, films, and drawings introduce alternative narratives or questions into apparently ordered structures. His approach has also involved a sustained investigation of the exhibition itself as an artistic medium, questioning how works are displayed, interpreted, and experienced within institutional contexts. MoMA’s 2003 presentation *Projects 79: Liam Gillick, Literally*, for example, brought together elements of architecture, design, cinematography, and writing to investigate conditions of creativity and the organisational structures underlying artistic production. Since the late 2000s, Gillick has also produced a series of films that extend his interest in the construction of the artist as a cultural figure. These include *Margin Time* (2012), *The Heavenly Lagoon* (2013), and *Hamilton: A Film by Liam Gillick* (2014). His writing forms an important parallel strand of his practice. He has contributed regularly to publications concerned with contemporary art and has published numerous books, including *Industry and Intelligence: Contemporary Art Since 1820*, published by Columbia University Press in 2016. He has also taught at Columbia University in New York since 1997. Gillick has exhibited internationally in major exhibitions including documenta and the Istanbul, Shanghai, and Venice Biennales. In 2009, he represented Germany at the 53rd Venice Biennale with *How Are You Going to Behave? A Kitchen Cat Speaks*, a project developed in relation to the history and architecture of the German Pavilion. His solo exhibitions have included presentations at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, Tate in London, the Whitechapel Gallery, the Palais de Tokyo, and the Serralves Museum in Porto. His work is held in major public collections including the Museum of Modern Art, the Centre Pompidou, and the Guggenheim museums in New York and Bilbao. Alongside his individual practice, Gillick has developed numerous collaborative and public projects. These include architectural and site-specific interventions for institutions and public buildings, including the former Home Office building in London and the Lufthansa headquarters in Frankfurt. He has also collaborated with artists including Philippe Parreno, Lawrence Weiner, Louise Lawler, and Adam Pendleton, as well as with the band New Order. Across these different forms, Gillick continues to investigate how art can function as a space for examining systems of production, social organisation, communication, and collective behaviour.