Upon returning to the UK after studying in the US, the Irish-born artist
Michael Craig-Martin (born 1941) became a key figure in British
conceptual art and an influential educator, linked in particular to the
generation of Young British Artists, including Damien Hirst and Gary
Hume. Craig-Martin's works transform recognizable objects--such as
sneakers, headphones, watches and, most recently, modernist
buildings--with bold color and simplified lines. He cites his
rationalism as the root of his art. Craig-Martin is the latest subject
of a three-year curatorial partnership between the Windsor Gallery,
Florida, and the Royal Academy of Arts, London, initiated to celebrate
the latter's 250th anniversary. This lively book reproduces a selection
of his paintings, prints and sculptures, with an essay by the art critic
Ben Luke and an exclusive interview between Tim Marlow and the artist.