Artist
Larry Achiampong
Artist
Artist Bio
Larry Achiampong’s projects employ film, still imagery, aural and visual archives, live performance, objects and sound to explore ideas surrounding class, gender, cross-cultural and digital identity.
With works that examine his communal and personal heritage – in particular, the intersection between popular culture and the residues of colonisation, Achiampong crate-digs the vaults of history. These investigations examine constructions of ‘the self’ through the activity of splicing the audible and visual materials of personal and interpersonal archives, offering multiple perspectives that reveal the deeply entrenched inequalities in contemporary society.
Achiampong (b. 1984, UK, British Ghanaian) is a BAFTA longlisted (2023) and Jarman Award nominated (2021) artist, filmmaker and musician. He completed a BA in Mixed Media Fine Art at University of Westminster in 2005 and an MA in Sculpture at The Slade School of Fine Art in 2008. In 2020 Achiampong was awarded the Stanley Picker fellowship and in 2019 received the Paul Hamlyn Artist award in recognition for his practice. He lives and works in London and Essex, and was a tutor on the Photography MA programme at Royal College of Art between 2016 – 2021. Achiampong served on the Board of Trustees at Iniva (Institute of International Visual Arts, 2017-2022) facilitating art policies in the UK and internationally and also holds a place on the board of trustees for Elephant Trust. He is represented by Copperfield, London and his films are distributed by LUX, London. Achiampong also holds a Black Belt (1st Dan) in Goju Ryu Karate Do and is a student of Kaizen Ryu Seiwakai East London.
Artwork Description
Part of Achiampong’s multi-disciplinary Relic Traveller project, DUALTIES examines postcolonial perspectives, the enduring connection between those born within the African continent and those of the African Diaspora, and the recent and growing phenomenon of returning diasporas.
