Heritage Executive Team
Meet our interdisciplinary team of experts.
Professor Andrew Burton
Professor of Fine Art
- Email: andrew.burton@ncl.ac.uk
- Telephone: +44 (0) 191 208 6074
- Personal Website: http://research.ncl.ac.uk/sacs/fineart/burton
My research situations sculpture and installation and in relation to landscape, historic sites and architecture. I lead a team researching the commissioning and consumption of contemporary art in heritage places which explores how and why heritage organisations commission contemporary art, and what the benefits are for artists, audiences and other stakeholders.
In my artistic practice, I take an experimental approach to materials and processes, using materials traditionally associated with sculpture and combining them with other materials and methods of making that embody impermanence.
I have worked extensively in India, China and Africa where I collaborate with artists, artisans and traditional craft workers. The work we make explores the territory between art, craft and quotidian objects and is characterised by the centrality of the human hand in the making process.
My current work in Africa, where I have led three projects funded by the AHRC Global Challenges Research Fund for international development is conducted in collaboration with art professionals and academics in the region, and explores the dynamics of artists' careers and livelihoods.
I have completed many artist residencies, including recently at the European Ceramics Work Centre in the Netherlands, and the Bundanon Trust and Hill End in Australia, where I made work about a landscape of eucalyptus trees and corrugated iron structures. In 2015 I was awarded the Gold Prize by the Korea Ceramic Biennial for my work 'Monument' and was invited by the Korea Ceramic Foundation in 2019 to construct and perform a work that would speak to the need to reconcile tensions between North and South Korea. The work combined 100 ancient kimchi jars with thousands of tiny, hand-made bricks.
I have supervised, and continue to supervise PhD students on a range of topics ranging from the use of concrete in contemporary sculpture to the relationship between landscape, archaeology and contemporary sculpture. I welcome inquiries from prospective PhD applicants interested in my fields of specialism.
My research and creative practice is in the field of contemporary sculpture with an emphasis on material, process and form. I work with materials as various as chilli peppers, bamboo, clay and cow dung - often exploring how these materials can work in combination with each other. Much of m work is collaborative. In 2011 I worked with a group of village women from farming communities around Delhi to create a group of 'bithooras' - extraordinary cow-dung structures based on fuel stores found on the periphery of Delhi for the National Craft Museum in Delhi. More recently I have been working with artisan workers in Kampala to explore how everyday low-tech practices can find different resonances through visual art. I have also been working in East Africa with a group of visual art professionals, exploring a flourishing visual art ecology in the region.
Much of my work experiments with reclaiming and re-using materials. My sculptures are often conceived as temporary structures – after a sculpture has been resolved it is broken up, with the component parts salvaged to form the building blocks for the next work. My sculptures made from miniature bricks are painted or coloured before they are dismantled. Over time, and as the bricks are formed into many different sculptures they gradually acquire on their surfaces a patina of the scraps of paint, cement and glaze that still remain. These surfaces convey a sense of their own history, alluding to the way in which over history architectural structures have anticipated our current concern with reuse.This work explores scale, referencing both monumental and day-to-day structures. In its emphasis on the re-use and recycling of earlier sculpture, the works provoke questions about the nature of monumentality and tensions between conservation and sustainability.
Since 2016 we have been developing work funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council exploring contemporary art commissioned for heritage places. This extended project has explored the commissioning of temporary visual art in heritage sites from multiple perspectives: does contemporary visual art sited in heritage properties really change the way visitors understand and appreciate the property itself? What challenges do artists face when they undertake these kinds of project? What is the landscape of this activity across the UK? Mapping Contemporary Art in the Heritage Experience is a collaboration between Newcastle and Leeds universities, the National Trust, English Heritage, the Churches Conservation Trust, Arts Council England and the Contemporary Visual Art Network.
- Farley R, King J, Burton A, Claxton K. Volunteer Voices: Industry Stakeholders Report, April 2022. Newcastle upon Tyne: Newcastle University, 2022.
- Burton A, Nabulime L, Newbery R, Richter P, Tibaingana A, Wilkinson A. Making a Living through and for Visual Artists in East Africa. In: Hracs BJ; Comunian R; England L, ed. Developing Creative Economies in Africa: Spaces and Working Practices. Abingdon: Routledge, 2021, pp.24-39.
- Black N, Burton A, Cass N, Farley R, King J, Newman A, Pollock V. Mapping Contemporary Art in the Heritage Experience: Industry Stakeholders Report. Newcastle upon Tyne: Arts and Humanities Research Council, 2020.
- Burton A, Coates M, Curran F, Fairnington M, Philipsz S, Stokes M. Mapping Contemporary Art in the Heritage Experience. North East England: National Trust Gibside, Holy Trinity Church, Sunderland; National Trust Cherryburn, Belsay Hall, 2018. In Preparation.
- Burton A, King J, Pollock V. Mapping Contemporary Art in the Heritage Experience. North East England: National Trust Gibside, Holy Trinity Church, Sunderland; National Trust Cherryburn, Belsay Hall, 2018. North East: North East England: National Trust Gibside, Holy Trinity Church, Sunderland; National Trust Cherryburn, Belsay Hall, 2018, 2018.
- Draeger C, Holzfeind H, Burton A, et al. From Without And From Within (The Auroville Project). 2017. Innsbruck, Austria: Kunstpavillon, 1.
- Burton A. Iron, Bark, Clay. 2016. New South Wales, Australia: Bathurst Regional Art Gallery, one installation.
- Burton A, Kaufman J, Harrison R, Heeney G, Vilotti U, Vehring F. World Association of Brick Artists, Nau Gaudi Museum, Mataro. 2016. Mataro, Spain: Nau Gaudi, 4. In Preparation.
- Burton A, Nabulime L. Banka y'Ekka. 2015. Kampala, Uganda: Makerere Gallery, Makerere University, 1.
- Burton AGC. Things Fall Apart III. Icheon, Seoul, South Korea: Korea Ceramic Foundation, 2015.
- Burton A. Vessel. Cottesloe, Perth, Australia: Cottesloe, 2015.
- Burton AGC. Things Fall Apart II. University of East Anglia, Norwich: Sainsbury Centre for Visual Art, 2014.
- Burton A. Vessels. 2014. London, UK: Andipa Gallery, one sculpture installation.
- Burton A. Vessels and Monuments. 2014. Norwich: Sainsbury Centre for Visual Art, University of East Anglia, 1.
- Burton A. Sheepfold II: Let Me Enfold You in My Icy Embrace. A site-specific sculpture (40,000 glass bricks, each cut by hand, UV adhesive) commissioned by the Institute for International Research in Glass and Ceramic Arts (IIRGCA), Sunderland and the National Glass Centre (NGC) for the exhibition Kith and Kin II, 21 September - 31 December 2012. Sunderland: National Glass Centre, 2012.
- Burton A. Making Bithooras. 2011. New Delhi, India: National Craft Museum, One installation.
- Burton A, Pontoreau D, Kaufmann J. Pen. A large-scale (8m x 8m x 2.2m) site-specific ceramic sculpture commissioned for the exhibition S’Imbriquer, Autour de la Brique, Maladrerie Saint-Lazare, Beauvais, France. 24th June - 18th September 2011. The exhibition was organised by the Ecole d’Art, Beauvais in their cycle ‘Terre/Ceramique’ and brought together twenty artists concerned with brick and architectural ceramicists, (other artists included Jacques Kaufmann, Daniel Pontoreau). 2011. Beauviais, France: Maladerie St Lazare, 1 installation.
- Aitchison W, Burton A, Delamour A, Gudmunsson S, Huttner P, Lin M, Renshaw N, Hansdolttir A, Weina L, vanVree D, Verhoel M, Xian K. Rolling Snowball. 2011. Quanzhou, China: Quanzhou Center for Contemporary Art, 2.
- Burton A, Drost B, Yang Z, Yiming M, Yuan Y. The Brothers and Us. 2011. Xiamen China: ShangShang Contemporary Art Space, 1.
- Burton A. Tierra del Fuego. 2011. Xiamen, China: Center for European and Chinese Art, 5.
- Burton AGC. Jug II. Shanghai, China: Shanghai World Expo, 2010.
- Burton A. Tholos. Globe Offsite, Newcastle upon Tyne: Globe Gallery, 2010.
- Burton AGC. Ceramics and Architecture. 2009. de Strijp: Eindhoven, Netherlands.
- Burton AGC. Brickworks. An extended body of 8 sculptures made from a single, large set of miniature, hand-made fired clay bricks, each 4cm x 2m x 1cm. Most of the works are conceived as ephemeral pieces, built on-site and broken up after exhibition, the bricks salvaged and re-used in new works. Two works, Jug and Chimney have reached a final ‘resolved’ form and are now permanently sited in London and Aarhus. As such, the separate sculptures link together over time as a family of pieces, formed from the same physical material and containing residual evidence of their former states. Most sculptures take the form of simple architectural structures such as stells (sheepfolds), buttresses or chimneys. 2008. Canary Wharf, London: Jubliee Gardens, 4.
- Burton AGC. Enclosure with Ladders for One Thousand Smashed Cultural Artefacts (Enclosure with Ladders). A site-specific sculpture, (Qing’s red bricks, ceramic, paint, 8m x 8m x 2.25m.), made for the exhibition Redefining Old Architectural Ceramics, Clayarch Gimhae Museum, South Korea, August 8th 2008 to August 2nd 2009. The exhibition comprised works by ten international artists, all specialising in ceramic sculpture, whom the Museum invited to ‘redefine’ architectural ceramics through working with a large quantity of bricks, some dating back to the 17th century, which had been procured from demolition sites in China. Gimhae, South Korea: Clayarch Museum of Architectural Ceramics, 2008.
- Burton A. Sculpture from a Land of Ants and Bees, an installation of 8 linked sculptural elements. 2006. Delhi, India: The ‘Charbargh’, British Council Building, 8 linked items.
- Burton A. Bronze. Holland Park, London, 1 2000.
- Andrew Burton. Durham Cow. Permanent site-specific commissioned sculpture in bronze, ceramic and stone, Durham City, 1 1997.
- Andrew Burton. All Afloat. Gallery of the European Ceramics Work Centre 'S-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands, 30 1996.
- Burton AGC. Walls, Mountains, Millstones. RIBA Sculpture Court, London; University of Northumbria Gallery, Newcastle upon Tyne, 10 1994.