Charlie Billingham (b. 1984, London, United Kingdom) lives and works in London, United Kingdom. He holds a BA from Edinburgh College of Art and the University of Edinburgh, Scotland and an MA from the Royal Academy of Arts, London, United Kingdom.
He creates highly vibrant and fluid paintings and installations using language borrowed from art, interior design, printmaking and art history. In his painting practice, for instance, Billingham has been inspired by historical imagery dating back to the late 18th – and early 19th century; Georgian and Regency etchings by James Gillray and George Cruikshank inspired one series of works. Billingham’s art often features minor characters and animals from such dated cartoons, portrayed in splashy colour combinations. The images might also be cropped or enlarged, rendered either as wallpaper or reversible motifs on canvases, and they thus reveal an original and contemporary twist on past iconography.
Billingham has been exhibited at the Royal Academy in London, the Saatchi Gallery, London, United Kingdom; Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh, Scotland; and Edinburgh College of Art, Scotland, among other institutions. His work is part of the Cini Foundation, Venice, Italy; the Franks Suss Collection, London, United Kingdom; Hong Kong, China; Saatchi Collection, London, United Kingdom; and the HSBC Collection, London, United Kingdom.
