Steven Claydon

The oeuvre of British artist Steven Claydon spans sculpture, installation, video, performance art and painting. A central theme of his work is the challenging or reappraisal of dominant thought patterns, canons and taxonomies. What is it that makes a mere “thing” a work of art, and what influential role does history play in it all?

Claydon questions these relationships with playful precision, working with a diversity of materials and within a broad aesthetic spectrum. Artefacts are juxtaposed with everyday objects, replicas with originals. The form of presentation, which is always part and parcel of the work, evokes the exhibiting traditions of Natural History museums and prehistoric collections, inevitably triggering questions about how collections and archives are structured, and how art is curated in general.