Bill Culbert is an artist working with photography, sculpture and installation, born in Port Chalmers, New Zealand, in 1935.

He came to London in 1957 to study at the Royal College of Art where he was awarded a silver medal for painting in 1960.

In 1964 he won the first prize in the Open Painting Competition organized by the Arts Council of Northern Ireland. In 1985 he was artist in residence at the museum of holography in New York and the following year he had a retrospective at the ICA, London. Culbert represented New Zealand at the 1990 Sydney Biennale and was represented by the London-based gallery Victoria Miro.

The turning point of his practice occurred in the mid-1960s when he abandoned painting to focus on the theme of light explored through photography, sculpture and installation. The material he used included light bulbs, lampshades, plastic bottles, suitcases and jugs.

Reference Bibliography:
Buckman D., 2006, Artists in Britain since 1945, Vol 1, Art Dictionaries Ltd, Bristol

www.suecrockford.com

www.sixfriedrichlisaugar.de

Glossary

  • Installation

    An artwork comprised of many and various elements of miscellaneous materials (see mixed media), light and sound, which is conceived for and occupies an entire space, gallery or site. The viewer can often enter or walk around the installation. Installations may only exist as long as they are installed, but can be re-created in different sites. Installation art emerged in the 1960s out of Environmental Art (works of art which are three-dimensional environments), but it was not until the 1970s that the term came into common use and not until the late 1980s that artists started to specialise in this kind of work, creating a genre of ‘Installation Art’. The term can also be applied to the arrangement of selected art works in an exhibition.

  • Painting

    Work of art made with paint on a surface. Often the surface, also called a support, is a tightly stretched piece of canvas, paper or a wooden panel. Painting involves a wide range of techniques and materials, along with the artist's intellectual concerns effecting the content of a work.

  • Sculpture

    A three-dimensional work of art. Such works may be carved, modelled, constructed, or cast. Sculptures can also be described as assemblage, in the round, relief, and made in a huge variety of media. Contemporary practice also includes live elements, as in Gilbert & George 'Living Sculpture' as well as broadcast work, radio or sound sculpture.

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