Biography
| EDUCATION | ||
| 2000-2001 | MA Fine Art | City and Guilds of London Art School, London |
| 1975-1978 | BA (Hons) Fine Art | Chelsea School of Art, London |
| ONE PERSON EXHIBITIONS | ||
| 2024 | Rest in Paint | Century Club, London |
| 2022 | Mendes and his Mentors | The Tub, London |
| 2021 | A Retrospective: It was 20 years ago today… | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2020 | Autorretrato: The Female Gaze | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2018 | Autorretrato | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2016 | The Death of the Artist | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2014 | Nachrufe / Obituaries | BRAUBACHfive, Frankfurt |
| 2014 | Obituaries & Other Works | High House Gallery, Oxford |
| 2013 | D.OA. the Good, the Bad and the Beautiful | Gusford, Los Angeles |
| 2012 | Obituaries | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2011 | 9/10/11 | KENNY SCHACHTER / ROVE, London |
| 2009 | An Existential Itch 2001-2008 | BRAUBACHfive, Frankfurt |
| 2009 | An Existential Itch 2001-2008 | Loading Bay Gallery, London |
| 2008 | An Existential Itch 2001-2008 | Fishmarket Gallery, Northampton |
| 2007 | Death from Above | Sartorial Contemporary Art, London |
| SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS | ||
| 2023 | Mendes and the Modernists | Austin Desmond Gallery, London |
| 2023 | Mendes & Co. Deceased | James Freeman Gallery, London |
| 2023 | The Subversive Landscape | Tremenheere Gallery, Penzance |
| 2022 | Summer Exhibition | Royal Academy of Arts, London |
| 2022 | Hugh Mendes and Thomas Doran | School Gallery, London |
| 2019 | 10 Years | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2019 | Summer Exhibition | Royal Academy, London |
| 2019 | Ruth Borchard Self Portrait Award | Piano Nobile Gallery, London |
| 2019 | The Rules of Freedom | Colyer Bristow Gallery, London |
| 2017 | In Memoriam Francesca Lowe | Old Truman Brewery, London |
| 2017 | Remains (two-person collaboration with Alistair Gordon) | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2017 | Part I: Street Semiotics (curated by Zavier Ellis) | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2015 | Black Paintings (curated by Zavier Ellis) | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2015 | Doppelganger | No Format Gallery, London |
| 2014 | The Great War | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2013 | War | Jacob’s Island, London |
| 2013 | Six Degrees of Separation | Wimbledon Art Space, London |
| 2012 | The End | Jacob’s Island, London |
| 2012 | The Saatchi Gallery & Channel 4’s New Sensations and THE FUTURE CAN WAIT (curated by Zavier Ellis, Simon Rumley & Rebecca Wilson) | B1, Victoria House, London |
| 2012 | The Serpent’s Tail | Witzenhausen Gallery, Amsterdam |
| 2012 | Polemically Small (curated by Zavier Ellis & Edward Lucie-Smith) | Orleans House Gallery, Twickenham |
| 2012 | The Id, the Ego and the Superego (curated by Zavier Ellis & Marcela Munteanu) | BRAUBACHfive, Frankfurt |
| 2011 | THE FUTURE CAN WAIT presents: Polemically Small (curated by | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| Zavier Ellis, Edward Lucie-Smith, Max Presneill & Simon Rumley) | ||
| 2011 | The Saatchi Gallery & Channel 4’s New Sensations and THE FUTURE CAN WAIT (curated by Zavier Ellis, Simon Rumley & Rebecca Wilson) | B1, Victoria House, London |
| 2011 | Polemically Small (curated by Edward Lucie-Smith) | Klaipeda Culture Centre, Klaipeda |
| 2011 | THE FUTURE CAN WAIT presents: Polemically Small (curated by Zavier Ellis, Edward Lucie-Smith, Max Presneill & Simon Rumley) | Torrance Art Museum, Torrance |
| 2011 | The Possessed (curated by John Stark) | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2010 | THE FUTURE CAN WAIT (curated by Zavier Ellis & Simon Rumley) | Shoreditch Town Hall, London |
| 2010 | Press Art | Museum der Moderne, Salzburg |
| 2010 | Papyrophilia | CHARLIE SMITH LONDON, London |
| 2009 | THE FUTURE CAN WAIT (curated by Zavier Ellis & Simon Rumley) | Old Truman Brewery, London |
| 2009 | New London School (curated by Zavier Ellis & Simon Rumley) | Gallerie Schuster, Berlin |
| 2008 | New London School (curated by Zavier Ellis & Simon Rumley) | Mark Moore Gallery, Los Angeles |
| 2007 | Still Life, Still | T1+2 Gallery, London |
| 2006 | New London Kicks | Wooster Projects, New York |
| 2005 | Fuckin’ Brilliant | Tokyo Wonder Site, Tokyo |
| 2005 | Art News | Raid Projects, Los Angeles |
| 2005 | Art News | Three Colts Gallery, London |
| 2005 | USUK | Lab Gallery, New York |
| 2005 | Green Door | Sartorial Art, London |
| 2004 | Forest | Rockwell Gallery, London |
| 2003 | Chockafukingblocked | Jeffery Charles Gallery, London |
| 2002 | Yesteryearnowadays | Hales Gallery, London |
| AWARDS & RESIDENCIES | ||
| 2003 | Fresh Art ‘Artist of the Year’ | |
| BIBLIOGRAPHY | ||
| 2011 | THE FUTURE CAN WAIT | Exhibition Catalogue |
| 2008 | THE FUTURE CAN WAIT | Exhibition Catalogue |
| 2008 | An Existential Itch, Craig Burnett | Fishmarket Publications (ISBN 978-0-9555 706) |
| COLLECTIONS | ||
| Wendy Asher, Los Angeles | ||
| Jerry Hall, London | ||
| Mauritz Huntzinger, Frankfurt | ||
| Angela Nikolakopoulou, London | ||
| Peter Nobel, Zurich | ||
| Kelsey Offield Ford, Los Angeles | ||
| Kenny Schachter, London | ||
| Steve Shane, New York | ||
| Bill Wyman, London | ||
| Wooster Projects, New York | ||
| Private collections in China, Germany, United Kingdom & United States | ||
Press Release
| Hugh Mendes | In Focus: Love in the time of Covid |
| EXHIBITION DATES: Wednesday 24 February – Saturday 13 March 2021 |
| EXHIBITION LINKS: artspaces.kunstmatrix.com/en/exhibition/4752812/hugh-mendes-in-focus-love-in-the-time-of-covid www.artsy.net/show/charlie-smith-london-hugh-mendes-in-focus-love-in-the-time-of-covid |
| CHARLIE SMITH LONDON is delighted to present a solo exhibition of new work by Hugh Mendes. Mendes is well known for his ongoing series of obituary paintings, which in recent years have focused on artists. But in the early stages of his career Mendes’ practice responded entirely to political events. Mendes began making oil paintings of newspaper pages in 2001 when he found a scrap of an Arabic newspaper in Brick Lane, east London. Blowing onto his feet, he picked up a picture of a turbaned man aiming a Kalashnikov, which he later made into a painting that formed part of a diptych, the other being a portrait of George W. Bush. Scheduled to be shown at Mendes’ MA final show, opening on September 11th 2001, the artist had portentously paired Bush with a Kalashnikov aimed at him by the then relatively unknown Osama Bin Laden. This became the precursor of one of Mendes’ two obsessions: the first being The War on Terror, a ten-year retrospective of which was exhibited at Kenny Schachter / ROVE; and the second being an unyielding recreation of newspaper Obituaries. During this fateful last year, Mendes has found himself responding once again to the tumultuous events that we have witnessed, specifically the Covid pandemic and the Black Lives Matter movement. As Mendes states: “People have noted that these events have had the most significant global impact since 9/11 and the subsequent fallout. I spent several days in hospital suffering from what was thought to be Covid related symptoms affecting my heart. I was rushed off in an ambulance with my heart lurching from 220bpm to 30bpm. I thought I might die, but my response was to make work on paper from my hospital bed, relating to Covid headlines…” Death has always been a dominant factor within Mendes’ oeuvre, from his direct engagement with obituaries to the more oblique symbolism of memento mori in still life painting. Death, and the political, have always been intertwined in the artist’s life. He was born on Armistice Day in 1955 in the British Military Hospital at Hostert, Germany, which ten years earlier served as a Nazi experimentation and death camp during the war. His mother worked as a nurse and was one of the first people to enter the Belsen concentration camp. She never fully recovered from the experience and suffered a consequential and untimely death when Mendes was 7 years old. His father worked with British intelligence during the war as a code breaker and interrogator of Nazi officers. After the war he became a newspaper editor, and significantly, after his death in 1998 Mendes found a collection of newspapers and clippings that covered important world events. Upon his death, Mendes spent several hours with his father’s body over two days and subsequently painted his portrait as a corpse. In this exhibition, then, Mendes returns to early methodologies and interweaves death, the political and love: “All my paintings come from a place of love in response to death, in the form of obituaries and what are often very difficult political events. The obituary paintings in particular are attempts to honour the subjects out of respect and love. They are loving memorials.” To view the exhibition virtually please click here: artspaces.kunstmatrix.com/en/exhibition/4752812/in-focus-love-in-the-time-of-covid To view the exhibition on Artsy please click here: www.artsy.net/show/charlie-smith-london-hugh-mendes-in-focus-love-in-the-time-of-covid Please contact gallery for images and further information |