David Shrigley Animations". www.davidshrigley.com. Archived from the original on 7 January 2016 . Retrieved 30 January 2016. Unsurprisingly, this obsession led him to being a “smart-arse” student by the time he’d arrived at Glasgow School of Art. His tutors didn’t always share the same outsider viewpoint. Was he disappointed with a 2:2 after his final show? He laughs. “I’ve realised my tastes are very peculiar relative to the rest of the world. I see genius and other people see rubbish. I see rubbish and they see genius.” These days he lets the gallery choose which works to exhibit.

Yet the art world loves him too. He was shortlisted for the Turner prize in 2013, causing perhaps the competition’s last real scandal, with a naked urinating statue. Once more he sounds utterly astounded by this endlessly confusing, utterly unknowable thing he’s devoted his life to. “It was just so exciting to find out that art is … actually good for people.”It’s the same reason he enjoys his more interactive work – inviting people to draw a giant urinating sculpture as part of his Turner prize show, opening pop-up tattoo parlours so people can have his doodles inked on to them, or inventing a bunch of strangely shaped instruments – such as a one-stringed electric guitar – and getting musicians to play them. One of his musical heroes, Sonic Youth’s Lee Ranaldo, recruited a bunch of avant garde musicians and terrorised a New York restaurant with Shrigley’s instruments. What did it sound like? Every bid submitted is treated as a maximum bid. You should always bid the maximum you are willing to The reason he now “delegates” the selection of his art for books or exhibitions is, he says, that his own choice never seemed to match what people want: “The gallery would send me an inventory of all the works that were unsold and I would look at them and think: ‘I can’t believe that that painting didn’t sell. I can’t believe that that one didn’t sell … That’s brilliant, that one!’ Things that were just perfect, that represented everything I wanted to say about my existence – and the meaning, and irony thereof. But did anybody agree with me? No. No. They just wanted the ones of the cat.”

David Shrigley has exhibited across the world, with his work featuring in high profile collections across the globe including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia; Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich, Germany; Art Institute of Chicago, Illinois; Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen; Museum Ludwig, Cologne, Germany; Thyssen-Bornemisza Contemporary Art Foundation, Vienna; Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh; Tate, London; and The British Council, London. Jason Mraz took the name of his album We Sing. We Dance. We Steal Things. from a work by Shrigley. [32] It’s not like he is trapped in the English countryside either. He frequently visits Copenhagen where he has the Shrig Shop (inspired by Keith Haring’s Pop Shop), which, even though it’s “around the corner and up the alley”, acts as the physical focus of his online business. I can’t help asking if he has sampled Copenhagen’s food scene. It turns out the legendary restaurant Noma gives departing staff a Shrigley print – and in return he gets free meals there. Yes, he confirms, it is as good as people say. Miller, Phil (27 January 2012). "A man of the people" (PDF). Herland Scotland . Retrieved 6 March 2019.Ramaswamy, Chitra (12 April 2010). "Interview: David Shrigley, artist". The Scotsman. Archived from the original on 18 June 2018. Alt URL [ permanent dead link] Your attitude was: what am I going to paint right now? Dinosaur. So you paint the Tyrannosaurus rex, and then you attach some text to the image of the Tyrannosaurus rex, and usually the Tyrannosaurus rex is saying something either violent or stupid. And that’s what I did when I was five. In my mind, it’s a similar format and attitude, albeit now I’m a middle-aged man who’s read some books and stuff. Inevitably, there is some craft that seeps in there but the work isn’t going to be any better if I could draw.”

That was just one of many very strange coincidences, and sort of odd things that happened along the way. The paper mill we used burned down, for example, which was quite difficult to deal with.” Despite his success with the highly collectable and instantly recognisable satirical drawings, Shrigley also works across other mediums including sculpture, animation, photography, large-scale installations and music. Shrigley’s Really Good, installed on the fourth plinth in London’s Trafalgar Square in September 2016. Photograph: David Levene/The GuardianHe tells me about a work he’s making at the moment which is harder to misread: “I’ve acquired 5,000 copies of Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, and I’m pulping them all,” he says, with a hint of mischief. “Then I’m making paper with it and, on that paper, I’m reprinting an edition of Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell.” He laughs. “I can do it because nobody wants to buy The Da Vinci Code any more – they just want to deposit it. So that for me is a project about: ‘Wake up! We are sleepwalking into a totalitarian regime!’” When he says he still paints as he did aged five, he doesn’t only mean he has avoided being ruined by craft skills. He is also referring to the “stupid or violent” words he would put in the creature’s mouth. New Cd From David Shrigley, Worried Noodles, 2007". www.davidshrigley.com. Archived from the original on 6 December 2008 . Retrieved 30 January 2016. Interview with Bill Kenny, 2003". David Shrigley. 2003. Archived from the original on 11 October 2011.

Edwin Gilson, " Five minutes with... David Shrigley, Brighton Festival 2018 guest director". The Argus (Brighton), 16 February 2018. Accessed 28 February 2018. Born in Cheshire in 1968, Shrigley started studying art at Leicester Polytechnic in 1987 before heading to Glasgow School of Art for his degree in environment art in 1988, a time when he believed “there wasn't a precedent for people selling work that wasn't figurative painting.” Shrigley believes he is an outsider to the art world for his flat compositions taking on the inconsequential, the bizarre, and the disquieting elements of daily life.

Not Deadly Serious: Glasgow School of Art graduate David Shrigley's macabre humour has seen his show at London's Hayward Gallery shortlisted for the Turner Prize". In 2021, Shrigley staged a conceptual exhibition 'Mayfair Tennis Ball Exchange'. [39] where the gallery was filled with new tennis balls, participants were encouraged to exchange the balls for ones of their own. Brettkelly-Chalmers, Kate (2015). "David Shrigley in Conversation With Kate Brettkelly-Chalmers". Ocula Magazine. Fisher, Glenn (2005). "What's with all the Funny Stuff?". David Shrigley. Archived from the original on 26 April 2006. Shrigley Forced To Speak With Others – Shrigley Forced To Speak With Others". Discogs . Retrieved 30 January 2016.