BIOGRAPHY

Oscillating between expression and constraint and advancing technological innovation while also utilising traditional craftsmanship, Alvarez’s sculptural forms challenge our perception of weight and gravity and appear both of this world and utterly separate from it. His practice focuses on the design of systems and the creation of tools and processes for producing sculptural objects and architecture.  The technology created by the artist to aid in the works creation are inextricable from the artist’s work, and even from himself. They highlight the way in which an artist can become both craftsman and engineer, and the tension between these two roles. Alvarez continues to playfully push the boundaries, creating works rich in tradition and at the same time utterly unconventional to create a truly unique and surprising sculptural environment.

Anton Alvarez (b.1980) graduated from the Royal College of Art, London, UK in 2012. Recent solo exhibitions include Honey, Millesgården Museum, Sweden (2022); Under Pressure, Rörstrands Museum, Sweden (2022); The Flavour is So Strong, Larsen Warner, Stockholm, Sweden (2019); L’Ultima Cera, Church San Bernardino alle Monache, Milan, Italy (2019); Visual Vertigo, Espace Muraille, Geneva, Switzerland (2019); To Plan the Unexpected, Christian Larsen, Stockholm, Sweden (2017); Alphabet Aerobics, National Centre for Craft and Design, UK (2016); How Long is a Piece of Thread, Xue Xue Institute, Taiwan (2016); Wrapsody, Salon 94, NY (2015). In September 2019 Alvarez was included included in the 10th Korean ceramic Biennale. Selected group shows include Ceramic Momentum: Staging the Object, Clay Keramikmuseum, Middelfart, Denmark (2019); The Most Real Thing: Contemporary Textiles and Sculpture, New Art centre, Roche Court, UK (2018); Color Your Life at Daelim Museum, Seoul, Korea and Wild Things at the Texture Museum, Belgium. Alvarez’s work is included in the public collections of the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, Sweden; Denver Art Museum, Colorado, USA and the Röhsska Museum, Gothenburg, Sweden as well as many prominent private collections. In 2015 Alvarez’s first major monograph Anton Alvarez: The Thread Wrapping Machine was published by Arvinius + Orfeus Publishing with a foreword by Richard Wentworth. 

“I like when you can see what my pieces contain and that it doesn’t become too advanced. As an observer you should be able to rewind the time when you look at a piece, and understand how it’s made. There should obviously be a touch of magic involved as well, something you don’t understand and can think about”

RAPTURE, 2021

THE FLAVOUR IS SO STRONG, 2019

SIDE BY SIDE, ONLINE 2020

TO PLAN THE UNEXPECTED, 2017