ABOUT
“Mark Neville has re-imagined what documentary photography could be, should be. Instead of the bland ‘deconstructions’ that pass so lazily as ‘critical’ in contemporary art, he makes extraordinary pictures and finds extraordinary ways to get them back to those he has photographed.” David Campany
British artist Mark Neville works at the intersection of art, activism, and documentary, investigating the social function of photography. Working closely with communities in a collaborative process intended to be of direct, practical benefit to the subject, his photographic projects have frequently made the places he portrays the primary audience for the work.
In his first project, The Port Glasgow Book Project, 2004, Neville made a coffee table book of his social documentary images of the working-class town, delivered exclusively to each of the eight thousand houses in the Port by the local boys' football team. The book was never made commercially available. Neville's concept was to undermine the framework of exploitation inherent in the way these types of images are usually disseminated.
In 2011, Neville spent three months working on the front line in Helmand, Afghanistan, with the British Army, as an official war artist, resulting in the project Battle Against Stigma, which challenged the stigma of mental health problems in the military. Neville personally delivered free copies of the book to homeless centres, prisons, and mental health charities throughout the UK. In 2012, The New York Times Magazine commissioned Neville to make the critically acclaimed photo essay Here is London, which examined wealth inequality in the capital, and was subsequently nominated for The Pulitzer Prize. This was quickly followed by a major commission from the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, US, which also explored social inequalities in the project Braddock/Sewickley. Neville's work is included in many public and private collections, including the Arts Council of England, Kunstmuseum Bern, National Galleries of Scotland, and the Archive of Modern Conflict. He has had major solo exhibitions at The Photographers’ Gallery, London, the Foundling Museum, London, QUAD in Derby, the V&A, London, and the Imperial War Museum, London. Group shows include Jeu de Paume, Paris, Tate Britain, and Haus Der Kunst, Munich. Fancy Pictures, the monograph published by Steidl, was nominated for both Time Magazine and the Aperture PhotoBook of the Year 2017.
Neville’s book Parade, a multi-layered portrait of the farming community in Brittany, France, was nominated for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2020. His activist pre-war photo book project, documenting Ukraine’s fight for independence, Stop Tanks With Books, was shortlisted for both the Arles PhotoBook Award and the Aperture PhotoBook Award 2022 and was voted The Art Newspaper’s best art book of 2022. Other projects include Fancy Pictures, 2008, Deeds Not Words, 2012, and Child’s Play, 2017. Neville has lived and worked in Kyiv, Ukraine since 2020, where he currently runs the hybrid humanitarian aid and photography project Postcode Ukraine.
Solo Shows
April 2022 ‘Ukraine in Focus’ V&A Museum, London
October 2020, ‘Parade’, Wolfson College, Oxford University
May 2019, ‘Parade’, GwinZegal Centre of Art, France
May 2019, ‘Detour’, Mystetskyi Arsenal National Art Museum, Kyiv, Ukraine
December 2018, ‘Here Is London’, Lianzhou Photo Festival 2018, Guangzhou, China
September 2018, ‘Child’s Play and other stories’, Singapore Arts House, Singapore, as part of the Singapore International Photography Festival 2018
March 2018, ‘Battle Against Stigma’, QUAD Museum in Derby
April 2017, 'London/Pittsburgh' The Multimedia Art Museum of Moscow, Russia
March 2017, 'Displaced Ukrainians', Centre for Eastern European and International Studies, Berlin
February 2017, 'Child's Play', The Foundling Museum, London
November 2015, 'SWITCH film installation', Nenagh, Tipperary, Ireland
July 2015, 'London/Pittsburgh' The Silver Eye Centre, Pittsburgh USA
December 2014, ' Art as Social Document', London School of Economics, London
November 2014, 'London/Pittsburgh' The Alan Cristea Gallery, London
July 2014, 'IWM Contemporary: Mark Neville' The Imperial War Museum, London
July 2013 'Deeds Not Words' The Photographers' Gallery, London
June 2010, 'Selected Films', Kunsthaus Essen, Germany
March 2010, 'The Jump Films Installation', Reg Vardy Gallery, UK
May 2008, 'Fancy Pictures', Mount Stuart, Isle of Bute, Scotland, UK
Nov 2006, 'Port Glasgow Book Project', Holden Gallery, Manchester, UK
Aug 2006, 'Port Glasgow Book Project', Dick Institute, Kilmarnock, UK
May 2006, 'Animal Architecture', Hunterian Museum Glasgow, Scotland, UK
April 2006, 'The Jump Films Installation', Street Level Gallery Glasgow, Scotland, UK
Group Shows
February 2020, ‘Parade’, The Photographers’ Gallery, London, as part of the Deutsche Borse Photography Award 2020
September 2018, ‘Criminal Ornamentation’ curated by Yinka Shonibare, touring UK
June 2018, ‘The Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation Art Prize 2018 finalists: Kate Groobey, Keith Milow and Mark Neville’, the Daiwa Foundation, London
June 2017, 'At the Still Point of the Turning World', Fotomusuem Antwerp
March 2017, 'War Paint', The National Army Museum
June 2016, The Royal Academy Summer Show, London
June 2016, 'British Subjects', Gwinzegal Art Centre, France
Feb 2016, 'The Portrait in Contemporary Photography', SK Kultur, Koln
July 2015, The Royal Academy Summer Show, London
May 2015, 'Work, Rest and Play', touring venues in China, OCT LOFT in Shenzhen, and Shanghai Minsheng Art Museum
April 2014, 'Conflict: Art and War', The Contemporary Art Society, London
April 2014, 'From Downs to Sea', Brighton Museum and Art Gallery
Sept 2013 'Catalyst: Contemporary Art and War' The Imperial War Museum, North
Sept 2013 'Still/Life' Tyntesfield. Works from the Arts Council Collection
June 2012, 'Factory Direct', The Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh, USA
2010-2012, 'Now Showing 2', Recent film work acquisitions from the Arts Council Collection, touring the UK
Sept 2011, 'The World We Live In', Turnpike Gallery, Leigh, UK
Dec 2010, 'Another Face', Hatton Gallery, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, UK
March 2010, 'The Gathering', Longside Gallery, Yorkshire, UK
Oct 2010, 'Luc Tuymans: A Vision of Central Europe' Brugge Central, Belgium
Oct 2009, 'Running Time: Artists Film in Scotland' Dean Gallery, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK
June 2009, 'Just Around the Corner', La Casa Encendida, Madrid, Spain
2008-2009, 'Parrworld', Haus Der Kunst, Baltic and Jeu de Paume, Germany, UK, France
May 2008, 'Intermezzo', Kunstmuseum, Bern, Switzerland
Oct 2006, 'The Moth and the Lamp', Kunsthalle, Bern, Switzerland
March 2006, 'Local Stories', Modern Art Oxford, UK
Feb 2006, 'What makes you and I different', Tramway, Glasgow, Scotland, UK
Dec 2004, 'A Century of Artists' Film in Britain', Tate Britain, London, UK
2004/2005, Publication and distribution of the book 'Port Glasgow'
Education
Rijksacademie, Amsterdam, Postgraduate Studies
Goldsmiths' College, London, M.A. Fine Arts
Reading University, Berkshire, B.A.Fine Arts
Recent Talks
London School of Economics and Political Science, Harvard University, Whitechapel Art Gallery, Kunsthalle Bern, Cornerhouse Manchester, University of Westminster, London, Tramway Glasgow, Newport College University of Wales, Bergen Kunsthall, Norway, London College of Communications
Recent Awards
2020 Nominated for the Deutsche Börse Photography Award 2020
2018 Nominated for the Daiwa Foundation Art Prize 2018
2015 Nominated for The Infinity Award for Fine Art
2013 Nominated by The New York Times for The Pulitzer Prize
2012 Recipient of The Wellcome Trust Large Arts Award