theEYE: David Batchelor

theEYE: David Batchelor

Synopsis

David Batchelor's art is about colour. With lightboxes and everyday plastics, eccentric chandeliers and projections, he brings pure, direct colour into galleries and public spaces. His works are immediately delightful, but they are also concerned with what colour means in today's world and with how we experience it. David Batchelor's art is also about the city. His colours are the bright, sharp hues of neon and artificial materials, not the soft tones of the natural world. In this profile, the artist is interviewed in his studio, the place where he explores and experiments with "the stuff of the world". He speaks about many key works and reflects on his distinctive public commissions, including a tower of colour for the Whitehall offices of the Treasury and an illuminated tree by the Thames. Like the best art, these are intellectual works, thoughtful and rigorous, but they are fun too, pleasurable and beautiful.