Artwork One

Artwork Two

Colour Photography

Black and White Photography

Design

Born In Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England.
Lives And Works In Edinburgh, Scotland.
Autodidact

Art Statement

I produce vibrant works on paper, wood, mdf and canvas in a neo-expressionist style that is often mistaken as 'outsider' but I take that as a compliment.

Intense and energetic, rich in vivid colour and heavily covered in text, stencils and bursts of texture, the works are primarily concerned with a universal experience filtered through my life, a social commentary.

Whilst the majority of my work evidently references pop, neo expressionism and outsider art, I have successfully developed a language of my own. Places that I have visited directly influence my work — the colours of New Orleans, the Caribbean and Malaysia, and the urban landscapes of New York, Paris, London and Berlin. Contemporary culture, history, geography, political and corporate worlds, word-play and music all get put into the food blender too.

My work has no set agenda, theme or subject matter — it is informed by what I am passionate about, what makes me angry and what makes me joyous — how I respond to what I see and hear around me... I try to find beauty in the ordinary, in the mundane, in the over-looked, and in what is commonly regarded as ugly... I am also scathing of what I see as unfair, cruel and brutal in the world. This is also your world.

Photography Statement

If my photographs have a mission at all, it is this: to capture both mundane and extraordinary scenes, moments and environments, people and events and present them in an interesting way. I don't set out to sew a narrative thread from one photograph to the next. Each image stands alone and tells its own story.

It may be a tube train emerging from a tunnel or the dark interior of an abandoned building or my walk into town. Whatever the locale, on the best of days, I hope to ignite unexpected feelings and thoughts in the viewer.

I have been creating photographs in theatre, concerts and festivals too for over 25 years.

Some things that I like and that may have inspired me...

The Limit Club
Willem De Kooning — almost everything but especially Ruth's Zowie & other work from 1957-63
New York City
George Orwell
David Bowie (everything except Never Let Me Down!)
Iggy Pop — but especially The Idiot & Lust For Life
The Ocean
Clouds & sky
Red wine
Cy Twombly — almost everything but especially The Coronation of Sesostris & The Four Seasons
George Best
Outsider Art
The Empire State Building
The Piano Bar Zakopane
Jean Michel Basquiat — almost everything but especially — In Italian, Nu Nile & The Dingoes that Park their Brains with their Gum
Great Jones Street
The Crucible Theatre, Sheffield
The happiness of melancholy
Elvis
Lomo Photographs
Paris
Erik's Parties
Brian Eno — On Land Discreet Music, Shutov Assembly, Apollo
Tate Modern
Julian Schnabel — Works On Paper & Palazzo Chupi
Dreaming
Abstract Expressionism
Joseph Beuys
Silence
Frost
Samo©
New Orleans
Miles Davis
Mark Lanegan — Bubblegum
Wassily Kandinsky
Philip Glass
David Sylvian
Weston Park Museum, Sheffield
Gilbert & George
Paloma Picasso — Minotaure
Zagorsk
The B52's (1st 2 albums)
Björk
Mark Rothko
Oil paint sticks
Arcylic paint
Oil paint
Berlin circa 1988 and 2004
Susan Rothenberg
Miami Beach
Samuel Beckett
The industrial landscape of Sheffield in the 60s & 70s
Steel Works
Ibrahim Hussein
The Clash
Langkawi
West Street
The Noguchi Museum
Pyewacket the cat (R.I.P.)
Joan Miró
Barcelona
Rare & Racy
MoMA
Woodstock
Midnight Cowboy
Zen
Blue Note & ECM album cover design
T.S.Eliot
Joy Division — especially Unknown Pleasures
Iceland
Dublin
Palma
Ho Chi Minh City, Ha Noi & Hué, Vietnam
Agnes B
The Isle Of Skye
Edinburgh
The day we went to Dia:Beacon with Joe
Stormking
Pearl Paint NYC
Andy Goldsworthy — especially his work with pebbles and leaves
Charlie Parker
Marrakech
Islamic Calligraphy
Charlotte Rampling
Amsterdam
Tord Gustavsen — Being There
Richard Hawley — Coles Corner
The Kills
Louise Bourgeois — Nature Study
Lulu Rouge — Bless You
Patti Smith — especially, Horses, Trampin’, Dream Of Life and her photography and poetry
London — especially Brick Lane and the Truman Brewery area
Hawksmoor churches — Christ Church Spitalfields & St Mary Woolnoth in particular
William Blake
Peter Lindbergh photography
Josef Müller-Brockmann
Dovecot Studios
My Summer of Love
Pina
Rob St. John — Weald
Vivian Maier photographs
Summerhall, Edinburgh
Most things and remember everyone dies but not everyone lives

Books

Contact

If you require any information on sales, exhibitions, commissions, use of or any other enquiry about my work, please feel free to contact me – enquiries@m-dawson.co.uk

+44 (0)781 492 4537.

Please note that prints are available for almost any painting / photograph on the site.