Approved: 06.02.2020

Tony Spencer

Artist, Curator, Event organiser, Project manager, Technician

Archived
Approved: 06.02.2020

Tony Spencer is a visual artist based at The Yard Studios, Winchester and a home Studio in Eastleigh. His art practice currently explores the relationship between sound, sculpture and installation, investigating the function of art through wellbeing and sacredness. He is interested in how the mechanics of sound propagates and penetrates matter through friction, vibrating at a related resonance to sculptural geometry.

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  • Location: Winchester, South West

Artist Statement

Tony Spencer is a visual artist based at The Yard Studios, Winchester and a home Studio in Eastleigh. His art practice currently explores the relationship between sound, sculpture and installation, investigating the function of art through wellbeing and sacredness. He is interested in how the mechanics of sound propagates and penetrates matter through friction, vibrating at a related resonance to sculptural geometry.

In January 2020 he was awarded an Arts Council England project grant to develop new work titled: No Thing 'is' Immediate. This includes constructing geometric installations from reconditioned wooden pallets, creating vessels to contain therapeutic sound frequencies, light and colour. As a Project Manager, he will work with four other visual artists and a number of creative practitioners, to co-curate the project within four galleries. Spencer is an artist with dyslexia and through Nothing 'is' Immediate he is concerned with creating work that communicates with people who have similar neurodivergence disabilities. 

In addition to practicing visual art he is a qualified Sound Therapist and member of the College of Sound Healing. He incorporates this research knowledge into his wider practice, exploring the benefits of sound and a broard spectrum of visual art on support people to conect with their wellbeing.

Spencer is interested in connecting with other artists who create a diferent experience for audiences by connecting to there artwork on a deeper spiritual level, and incorporating this expession in a co-created performative live-art rituals. His aceptance and curiosity of metaphysics and animism are influenced by a two year self-directed international residency in Kartong, The Gambia, where he performed as a tradition village Djembe (drum) player, exploring a physical, emotional and spiritual connection to rhythmic vibration. Whilst there, he participated in animistic rituals at sacred sites, performed by village elders who use their voice to chant and offer blessings, connecting participants to their own higher intentions through nature and a metaphysical world.

His philosophical discourse is inspired by Robert Holden's explanation of the Rise-Hudson Enneagram, talks on authentic living by Guru Sri Anish and Jonny Golding Professor of Phylosophy and Fine Art at the Royal College of Art.

He has an MA in Gallery Studies and BA (Hons) in Fine Art Sculpture. Tony lives in Eastleigh, Hampshire (UK).

CV & Education

Tony Spencer 

Email: [email protected]

Mobile: 07517 729034

Website; tony-spencer.com

Visual Artist based in Winchester, UK 

Lives in Eastleigh, Hampshire, UK

Associate Artist at CAS: http://www.chapelartsstudios.co.uk/artists/tony-spencer/

Employment

April 2020 - present - Freelance Visual Artist and Sound Therapist

2018 to April 2020 - Exhibitions Programme Manager - 'a space' arts, Southampton 

2015 to 2018 - Exhibitions & Gallery Manager - Aspex, Portsmouth

Education

MA Gallery Studies, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK

BA (HONS) Fine Art Sculpture, Northumbria University Newcastle, UK

Relevant Training

Art Handling - Patina Art Collection Care, West Dean College

Sound Therapist – College of Sound Healing

Forest School Leader Level 3 – Birchwood Learning, Sustainability Centre

7307 Adult Teaching – Newcastle College, Newcastle upon Tyne

Works & Projects

2020 Nothing Would Disturb Me - Sandham Memorial Chapel, UK

2020  Dawn Chorus - Eastleigh Museum, Eastleigh, UK

2019  Sermon On The Seventh Beatitude – Arches, Southampton, UK

2019   Flesh and Blood - Spudworks, Hampshire, UK

2019   Church of David Hockney – Arches Studio,  Southampton, UK

2019   The Cube – BEAF2019, UK

2017   Music Box - The Point, Eastleigh, UK

2017   Spearman – with Kye Wilson at Journeys Festival, UK

2017   Spearman -  with Kye Wilson at Kartong Festival, The Gambia

2014   Space-in-space - 360 Degrees Sculpture Residential, The Gambia

2001   138 Degrees 11 Minutes - Northumbria University Newcastle, UK

Awards

2020  No Thing ‘is’ Immediate - Arts Council England Project Grant

2019   The Cube – BEAF2019 commission

2017   Spearman - Arts Council England Grants for the Arts

Residencies

2018   Murmuration - Glenshee, Scotland, UK

2012  Kartong - The Gambia

Curation

2019   #Flaunt It 1 & 2 – Arches Studios, Southampton, UK

2018   ArtVaults: Live, Rara Avis – Canute’s Palace, Southampton, UK

2017   Countless by Maya Ramsay - Aspex, Portsmouth, UK

2016   Double Dutch works by the late Ben Cove – Aspex, Portsmouth, UK

2014   360 Degrees Sculpture Residential, The Gambia