Antenna

About

Stephen Burke’s Solo Residency Exhibition “Antenna” is an exploration into the visual language of the public realm. Stephen is an interpreter, a researcher and urban vagabond collecting the language of the anonymous and overlooked and bringing those signals into his studio, producing a body of work that is both quotation and reflection. Witnessing the markmaking hieroglyphics that riddle the urban experience is an intense and academic investigation for Stephen. Take a walk through London and have him interpret and explain the codified language of graffiti artists, but more intriguing and directly related to his studio practice are the marks of eradication that become the focus of his acute observational skills.

Stephen Burke is a visual artist from Dublin, Ireland and has been the 16th Solo Resident at Unit 1 Gallery | Workshop. He graduated with a B.A in Printmaking from NCAD in 2016 and went on to complete a Masters in Painting from the Glasgow School of Art in 2018. He co-authored a book entitled ‘Buff’, which investigates graffiti removal as an artistic process and was published with an accompanying exhibition at The Library Project, Dublin in 2017. More recently, Stephen completed a six-month residency in Berlin with Urban Nation. During this time he further developed the project ‘Post-vandalism’, which is accessible on social media and explores contemporary artworks that are linked to the aesthetics and concepts of graffiti.

Visitors will also have the opportunity to see the Radical Residency® VI Exhibition, featuring works by 10 artists working side by side in our main gallery space for one month, opening on the same day.

Unit 1 Gallery | Workshop is an exhibition and residency space in London and unique in its approach to bringing artists and their practices to the public. They support a diverse range of emerging and mid-career contemporary artists by providing them with space and time to develop their practice, network within our growing community, be mentored by team members and crucially be introduced to their expansive network of collectors, art educators, professionals and visitors.

Through their residency programmes and exhibitions, they give artists, curators and theorists a platform to present work and share ideas as well as creating an environment for freethinking and exchange. They have now organised more than 40 exhibitions with over 120 artists and curators, with 10 exhibitions and 25 artists in residence a year, drawing in international audiences and participants, as well as being a local landmark in the community of Kensington and Chelsea and its surrounds. Unit 1 Gallery | Workshop was founded in 2015 by artist Stacie McCormick in a former builder’s merchant