[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]PopUp Painting’s ‘artist of the week’ is Bridget Riley.
Bridget Riley is a British artist from London, who was one of the founding members of the ‘Op-art’ movement of the 1960’s. The artist studied at Goldsmiths’ College and at the Royal College of Art.
Riley’s early career saw the artist painting figuratively in a semi-impressionist manner. The artist then changed to pointillism around 1958, mainly producing landscapes. It wasn’t until 1960 that Riley’s work evolved into a style that explored the dynamic potentialities of optical phenomena. Riley created black and white geometric patterns that played with viewers vision. These so-called ‘Op-art’ pieces, produced a disorienting physical effect on the eye, audiences noted that the paintings evoked sensations of feeling seasick. Riley’s early paintings were created in monochromatic tones until the artist introduced colour and contrast in 1967. Over the course of her career, Riley has created temporary murals for major art institutions, including the Tate, the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris and the National Gallery, London. In 2014 Riley was commissioned to make a permanent 56-meter mural for St Mary’s Hospital, London. Riley taught at Loughborough School of Art, Hornsey School of Art, and Croydon School of Art.
In 1968 she won an International Painting Prize at the Venice Biennale and was the first British contemporary painter, and the first woman, to be awarded the prize. As well as having an incredibly influential and successful career as a painter, Bridget Riley has also worked as a writer and curator of art. The artist has curated exhibitions at the Hayward Gallery, Tate and the National Gallery.
In 2003 the Tate Britain organised a major Bridget Riley retrospective.
We will be featuring Bridget Riley’s work all week on our Facebook and Twitter pages, but in the meantime here is a selection of our favourite works by the artist:[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_media_grid grid_id=”vc_gid:1493235123211-5496e1f0-992b-0″ include=”19332,19333,19334,19335,19336,19337,19338,19339,19340,19341,19342,19343″][/vc_column][/vc_row]