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Richard Woods (born 1966, Chester, UK) is a contemporary installation artist best known for his signature large scale wood-block printed cartoon floor board installations collectively titled ‘Logo’, first exhibited at Tabley House, Chesire in 2000. Other architectural vernacular motifs have been given a similar treatment such as crazy paving at the 50th Venice Biennial, 2003 for Import / Export Sculpture, redbrick at New College, Oxford for NewBUILD, 2005 and Mock-Tudor for Super Tudor, New York, 2003 and Seoul Tudor, Seoul, South Korea, 2010.

His hometown of Chester and the surrounding area have had a huge influence on his work.

“Well I’ve always been interested in that notion of ‘the real’. Chester lives off this strange aesthetic. It’s a kind of Roman/Tudor town, but obviously almost everything that’s there is Victorian. It’s the worst kept secret but then nobody seems to really mind. I enjoy that. That style of pattern and architecture, it started out in one period and then it mutated a little bit then it mutated again and then mutates again. I don’t think any kind of time period has ownership over it. It has very different interesting connotations. Chester’s brilliant for that, it was like growing up in a kind of theme-park.” Other strong influences include William Morris. Wood’s first ‘Floral Repeat’ work was commissioned by Delmar & Isabella Blow in 2000 and similar Arts & Crafts motifs have been culled from the shelves of B&Q and Home base, already kitsch interpretations of Morris’s original patterns, ever since, most recently for his exhibition at Lever House, New York for ‘Port Sunlight’ a series of 9 floral and Tudor patterns inspired by the Cheshire village of the same name and the Arts & Crafts collection at the Lady Lever Art Gallery.

Since 2007 Woods had been collaborating with designer Sebastian Wrong to produce furniture and design objects of which ‘Wrong Woods’ has become a contemporary design classic. The woodblock print used on the Wrong Woods cabinets is a particularly recognizable Woods signature print. Designer Sebastian Wrong teamed up with Woods as part of the Established & Sons’ program of ‘Collaborations’ where individuals from two different creative fields apply their skills to a single design. Woods’ motifs were applied to utilitarian cabinets, reminiscent of 1950s furniture, designed by Wrong. The family of storage cabinets produced includes a small night table, a chest of drawers, a long low credenza and a wall unit.

Other collaborations include those with Sir Paul Smith for Happy Shop (2005), Red Ear Jeans (2001), Tokyo, JP and 142 Greene Street (2006), New York, US, Comme de Garcon (2002), Osaka, JP, Ab Rogers Design for Rainbow House (London, UK), Peter Marino for Chanel (New York, US) and Alex de Rijke at dRMM Architects for MK Forty Tower, (2007) Milton Keynes Gallery, UK and The Yard, Modern Art Oxford, Oxford, UK and design products for Memphis Milano since 2008.

Lund Humphries published artist monographs ‘Richard Woods’ in 2005 and ‘The Art & Craft of Richard Woods’in 2012.

Recent exhibitions and projects include:

innovation – investment – progress, Liverpool Biennial (2008) wall and door and roof, City Hall, New York (2010) Port Sunlight. The Lever House Collection, New York (2010) Flora & Fauna, Milton Keynes Gallery, UK (2008) Seoul Tudor, Hamon Plaza, Seoul, South Korea (2010)