Giles Round
Giles Round, Il Mostro, 2022. View at Hotel Ladinia, Ortisei. Commissioned by Biennale Gherdëina ∞. Ph. Tiberio Sorvillo
Artist Giles Round works across disciplines – including art, design and architecture – through a wide range of techniques and approaches including ceramics, furniture, painting, print, sculpture and sound. Often taking the form of long-term, open-ended projects in which exhibitions themselves become the medium, Round’s works have at times produced organisations and companies as artworks. Through these, the artist creates conceptual frames to interrogate the role of the artist as an agent of transformation. Indeed, organisations and companies created by Round as part of his conceptual practice are fully operational: The Grantchester Pottery was set up as a ceramics design studio, while the design company DESIGN WORK LEISURE was created as part of a commission by London Underground to investigate the effects of design on wellbeing.
Giles Round, Il Mostro, 2022. View at Sala Trenker, Ortisei. Commissioned by Biennale Gherdëina ∞. Ph. Tiberio Sorvillo
Responding to the research that emerged out of Round’s embedded position within the art direction of the Biennale Gherdëina ∞, the artist was inspired by the rich mythology of the Dolomites as well as the valley’s woodcarving tradition to develop a new mythological creature, a small melancholy monster called Leonardo – part-endangered species, part-outsider archetype, part-avatar of the artist themself. Through interventions in the city, narrative untoldings and the creation of a new toy, Il Mostro insinuates itself into the cultural tradition of the Val Gardena, to investigate the birth of new stories, the crystallisation of memory, and the mythological role played by insider/outsider characters across deep time.
Giles Round, Il Mostro, 2022. View at Hotel Ladinia, Ortisei. Commissioned by Biennale Gherdëina ∞. Ph. Tiberio Sorvillo
Giles Round
Giles Round, Il Mostro, 2022. View at Hotel Ladinia, Ortisei. Commissioned by Biennale Gherdëina ∞. Ph. Tiberio Sorvillo
Artist Giles Round works across disciplines – including art, design and architecture – through a wide range of techniques and approaches including ceramics, furniture, painting, print, sculpture and sound. Often taking the form of long-term, open-ended projects in which exhibitions themselves become the medium, Round’s works have at times produced organisations and companies as artworks. Through these, the artist creates conceptual frames to interrogate the role of the artist as an agent of transformation. Indeed, organisations and companies created by Round as part of his conceptual practice are fully operational: The Grantchester Pottery was set up as a ceramics design studio, while the design company DESIGN WORK LEISURE was created as part of a commission by London Underground to investigate the effects of design on wellbeing.
Giles Round, Il Mostro, 2022. View at Sala Trenker, Ortisei. Commissioned by Biennale Gherdëina ∞. Ph. Tiberio Sorvillo
Responding to the research that emerged out of Round’s embedded position within the art direction of the Biennale Gherdëina ∞, the artist was inspired by the rich mythology of the Dolomites as well as the valley’s woodcarving tradition to develop a new mythological creature, a small melancholy monster called Leonardo – part-endangered species, part-outsider archetype, part-avatar of the artist themself. Through interventions in the city, narrative untoldings and the creation of a new toy, Il Mostro insinuates itself into the cultural tradition of the Val Gardena, to investigate the birth of new stories, the crystallisation of memory, and the mythological role played by insider/outsider characters across deep time.
Giles Round, Il Mostro, 2022. View at Hotel Ladinia, Ortisei. Commissioned by Biennale Gherdëina ∞. Ph. Tiberio Sorvillo