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Clive Brandon

Muir of Ord
Visual artist based on the Black Isle, working primarily with painting and collage. I make constructed landscapes from found imagery, observation and memory, exploring places shaped by human intervention, extraction and ecological change.

My practice responds to the landscapes, architecture, spaces, and places I inhabit and explore, drawing upon my deep connection to the environment. Recent work focuses on the concept of the ‘constructed landscape,’ exploring how human intervention shapes and reshapes natural spaces.

Through an experimental and often improvised process, I use a diverse range of materials, including found objects like cardboard, scrap wood, and paper, combined with watercolour, charcoal, and newsprint. My pieces evoke both real and imagined landscapes, grounded in my surroundings yet speaking to broader questions about our relationship with nature. These works are informed by the Japanese aesthetic of wabi sabi, celebrating imperfection and impermanence, as well as ‘Casualist’ art influences, creating lo-fi pieces that embrace the beauty of the unfinished and the temporary. 

Through my art, I invite viewers to consider the landscapes we inhabit—not only as physical spaces but as constructs shaped by human hands.

Lived Experience

I live on a smallholding on the Black Isle in the Scottish Highlands, where we have developed a permaculture-inspired forest garden and run two off-grid eco cabins. My time is divided between tending the gardens, running the accommodation and making work in my home studio.

Since relocating from the city to the Scottish Highlands in 2015, I have become increasingly attuned to the rhythms and changing conditions of the landscape around me. The seasons and ongoing changes in the land are part of everyday life and naturally feed into my work.

My experience of regenerative gardening has also influenced the way I think about landscape. Both gardening and making art involve close observation, recognising patterns and responding to change. Living and working in this way has deepened my awareness of the relationship between human activity and the natural environment, and of the wider ecological and climate changes affecting the landscapes around us.

 

Born 1970 UK, lives on Black Isle, Scotland

1993 – 1996 De Montfort University, Leicester, BA Fine Art & Art History

2006 – 2008 Wimbledon College of Art, London, MA Fine Art (Part Time/AHRC funded)

2025 Creative Practice 4 (Part Time), Moray School of Art

Solo Exhibitions

2015 Travelogue/Northern European Residencies 2013-14, The Briggait, Glasgow

2011 Strategies, Contingencies & Failures, Galerie Hubert Baechler, Zurich, Switzerland

2007 Work Makes Dust, Galerie Hubert Baechler, Zurich, Switzerland

2004 3 Route Dislocation, Galerie Hubert Baechler, Zurich, Switzerland

Selected Group Exhibitions

2026 Terrain, Auto Amor, Sevenoaks

2026 Members Exhibition, An Talla Solais, Ullapool

2026 Strata, Presented by Visual Arts Scotland, Inverness Creative Academy

2025 Awkward Objects, Circus Artspace, Inverness, UK

2025 Mind The Gap, Moray School of Art, Elgin, UK

2018 Trace Ingredients (collaboration with Cat Meighan), IMAG, Inverness, UK

2014 AxisWeb, London Art Fair, London, UK

2012 End of the Future, Transition Gallery, London, UK

2012 Jam Tomorrow, APT Gallery, London, UK

2011 Crash Open Salon, Charlie Dutton Gallery, London, UK

2011 Points of Non-Interest, Mint Hotel, London, UK (in association with Whitechapel Gallery and London Met MA Curating Course)

2009 I can bring this to your city, Island Projects London, UK

2009 Olympic Visions, The Nunnery, London, UK

2008 New Territories, Ada St Gallery, London, UK

2008 Matter of Time, James Taylor Gallery, London, UK

2008 Signs of Life, Offsite Project, London, UK

2008 M is for MA, Wimbledon College of Arts, London, UK

2008 Approaches to What?, The Nunnery, London, UK

2008 The Best Is Yet To Come, Galerie Hubert Baechler, Zurich, CH

2007 Currents, Trinity Buoy Wharf, London, UK

2006 PreviewBerlin, Backfabrik, Berlin, DE

2006 Points of Non-Interest, Guest artist of WalkWalkWalk, London, UK

2005 Acid Drops and Sugar Candy, Transition Gallery, London, UK

2005 The Wrong Map, Three Colts Gallery, London, UK, (curated by C A Brandon) 2004 E9: An Anatomy of an Area, Transition Gallery, London, UK

2003 Sense & Sensibility, Transition Gallery, London, UK

1999 999, Troesch Building, Bellinzona, Switzerland

Residencies and Workshops

2016/17/18/19 ‘Sketchiness’ urban sketching workshop in Inverness as part of Festival of Architecture

2017 Exchange Residency North,Victorian Market, Inverness, Scotland

2016 Exchange Residency North, The Clay Studio, Inverness, Scotland

2014 WASPS The Booth, Shetland

2014 AiR Hafnarborg, The Hafnarfjordur Centre of Culture and Fine Art, Iceland

2013 AiR Ricklundgarden, Saxnas, Sweden

2013 AiR Konstepidemin, Goteborg, Sweden

2013 WASPS The Steeple, Newburgh, Scotland

2013 Artist in Residence at KINOKINO Centre for Art and Film, Sandnes, Norway

Publications 2004 E9: An Anatomy of an Area Catalogue ISBN 0-09548954-0-1


 

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