London - Michael Craig-Martin’s first major London exhibition in seven years will go on show at the Gagosian Gallery in Britannia Street from 30 November – 26 January 2007. The show, titled A is For Umbrella will consist of new works by the artist. This show will focus on two areas of new work both of which represent a significant departure for the artist.

He will present a series of paintings where for the first time he uses words in conjunction with images, and also large-scale computer/monitor works that include portraits.

Born in Dublin in 1941, Michael Craig-Martin was raised in the USA where he studied fine art at Yale University. He came to Britain in 1966 having been offered a teaching job at the Bath Academy of Art. He began teaching at Goldsmiths’ College in 1973, where he influenced a generation of students who came to prominence in the 80’s and 90’s including Julian Opie, Sarah Lucas, Gary Hume, and Damien Hirst.

His first solo exhibition was in London in 1969, and he gained international recognition through his participation in the definitive exhibition of British conceptual art, The New Art at the Hayward Gallery in 1972. His work has been shown in numerous solo and group exhibitions in Britain and internationally. Recent solo exhibitions include A Retrospective 1964-2006, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin; Signs of Life, Kunsthaus Bregenz, Austria, 2006.

Over his career, he has explored the expressive and linguistic character of commonplace objects. His best known works include An oak tree of 1973, in which he claimed to have changed a glass of water into an oak tree. In the late 70’s he began making the black and white wall drawings that have been the foundation for most of his subsequent work. He is now best known for his intensely coloured paintings, large scale installations and public commissions (The Fan at Regents Place on the Euston Road), and his collaborations with architects (the Laban Dance Centre in Deptford with Herzog and DeMeuron).

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