Bio

Paul Snell was born in Australia in 1968 and has been working as an artist and art educator for the past 20 years.

His work is held in private and public collections nationally and internationally including Art Bank, The Justin House Museum, and The Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery. Snell has been a finalist in many National Prizes including The Blake Prize (2011), The Geelong Print Prize (2011), and The Sunshine Coast Art Prize (2013). In 2012 he won the nationally recognised Tidal Art Prize and The Flanagan Art Prize and in 2015 he won the $25,000 Whyalla Art Award.

In 2010, 2013 and 2018 Snell travelled to London and New York undertaking research and development for his practice and in 2011 he was awarded his MCA from the University of Tasmania.

In July 2013 his work was on show at Art Hamptons, an international art fair just outside of New York.

Artist Statement

These digital photographic works demonstrate the expansion of the creative potentialof digital image making. The works speak of photography’s transition from object to pure information. Through the re-structuring, removing and refining of data I have sought to throw off the shackles of conventional representation. The work is purely formal and self-referential in its intentions; colour is the fundamental ingredient and its vibrancy is maximised by form.
The reductive nature of these pieces examines and brings into question the image as self-referential object. The work seeks a dialogue in the sense of perceiving and using visual levels of perception to create a physical, mental and sensorial experience. The absence of signs or objects invites the viewer to drift among primal and tonal aesthetic matter. The aim has been to immerse the viewer in colour, rhythm and space, creating a sensory experience of inner contemplation and transcendence.
The pause, the gap and the omission are increasingly significant in our saturated image driven society. Through this body of work the daily saturation is replaced by selective sensitisation, the sharpening of individual senses; these pieces invite concentration, quiet and even silence. By rhythmically repeating, pairing, overlapping, reversing and sequencing and through the investigations of specific colour relationships, I seek a sensory understanding of the physical object. The primary intention of this body of non-objective work is to create a visual experience, utilizing the basic elements of line, colour, surface and light.
These works involves furthering the concepts of reduction (of form, space, line and material) and the effect of colour as visual signature. By developing these concepts, I am inviting the viewer into the space for a contemplative experience with the work.

Selected CV

Academic Qualifications: 2009 – 11 MCA, University of Tasmania.1995 – Bachelor of Fine Arts (Hons), University of Tasmania.1990 – Diploma of Education, University of Tasmania.1987-89 – Bachelor of Fine Arts, University of Tasmania.

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2017

Mute, Colville Gallery, Hobart, Tas

Chromophilia, Gallery 9, Sydney, NSW

The Liminal Space, Moonah Arts Centre, Hobart, Tas

2016

The Liminal Space, QVMAG, Launceston, Tas

Formal, Gallery 9, Sydney, NSW

2015

Intersect, Colville Gallery, Hobart, Tas

Sectant, Gallery 9, NSW

Decoding Sydney, Gaffa, Sydney, NSW

2014

Shift, Colville Gallery Hobart, Tas

2013

Chromophobia, Colville Gallery, Hobart, Tas

Decoding New York. Edmund Pearce Gallery, Vic

Chromophobia, Rex Livingston Gallery, Sydney, NSW

Chromophobia, Jan Manton Gallery, Qld

2012

Afterimage, Devonport Regional Gallery, Tas

The Persistence of Vision, The Colour Factory, Melbourne, Vic

Codes and Convensions, Colville Gallery, Hobart, Tas

2011

Afterglow, 146 Artspace, Hobart, Tas

Selected Exhibitions

Josephine Ulrick & Win Schubert Photography Award, Gold Coast City Gallery, Qld

Wyndham Art Prize, Vic

The Bay of Fires Art Prize, Tas

The Whyalla Art Prize, SA

Hazelhurst Art Award, Hazelhurst Regional Gallery, NSW

The Bay of Fires Art Prize, Tas

NEO-O-10, Stephen McLaughlan Gallery, Vic

Paramor Art Prize, Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre, NSW

Works in Collections

Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, Tasmania

Justin House Museum, Victoria

Pine Rivers Regional gallery, Brisbane

Art Bank, Australia

Devonport Regional Gallery, Tasmania

Burnie Regional Gallery, Tasmania

Awards

2015

Winner, Whyalla Art Award, South Australia

Winner, Moreton Bay Art Award, Pine Rivers Gallery Brisbane

2012

Winner, Flanagan Art Prize, Ballarat,Vic

Winner, Tidal Art Prize, Devonport Regional Gallery, Devonport