Richard Deacon Interview: Advice to the Young

“Get up early in the morning and go to work – and say hello to people on the way.” Get sound advice from a frontrunner of British sculpture, Richard Deacon, who finds that putting in the hours and treating others well will get you a long way. When Deacon went to art school, making art wasn’t considered a means of earning a living, so you did it for other reasons. From personal experience, he finds that making art for the sake of the money never works. Richard Deacon (b. 1949 in Wales) is a British artist whose voluptuous abstract forms have placed him at the forefront of British sculpture since the 1980s. Deacon’s catalogue of materials is vast and diverse and has included laminated wood, stainless steel, corrugated iron, polycarbonate, marble, clay, vinyl, foam and leather. Solo exhibitions include San Diego Museum of Art in San Diego, Prague City Gallery in Prague, Tate Britain and Whitechapel Art Gallery in London, PS1 Contemporary Art Center in New York City and Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. In 2007 he represented Wales at the Venice Biennale, and he has also participated in Glasgow International (2006) and the documenta 9 in Kassel (1992). Deacon won the Turner Prize in 1987 and was awarded the Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et Lettres by the Ministry of Culture, France in 1996 and was made a CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) in 1999. He lives and works in London. For more see: http://www.richarddeacon.net/ Richard Deacon was interviewed by Marc-Christoph Wagner at Galleri Suanne Ottesen in Copenhagen in August 2018 in connection with the exhibition ‘Ian McKeever and Richard Deacon’. Camera: Rasmus Quistgaard Produced by: Marc-Christoph Wagner Edited by: Roxanne Bagheshirin Lærkesen Copyright: Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2019 Supported by Nordea-fonden FOLLOW US HERE! Website: http://channel.louisiana.dk Facebook:   / louisianachannel   Instagram:   / louisianachannel   Twitter:   / louisianachann