Martin Creed has become known for hugely varied work, which is by turns uncompromising, entertaining, shocking and beautiful. Our online presentation features selected paintings, sculptures, tapestry, video and music, coinciding with the unveiling of a new neon, ‘Work No. 3435 EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE ALRIGHT’, at Braemar Castle in Aberdeenshire, Scotland.

A small-scale edition of this multicolored neon is now available exclusively to purchase online.

2020
White neon
Edition of 20 + 4 AP
7.5 x 206.5 cm / 3 x 81 ¼ in

The works featured in the online presentation include a selection of brightly colored stack paintings, broccoli paintings, horizontal striped tapestries and toast sculptures, two with peanut butter and one without.

Awarded the Turner Prize in 2001 for ‘Work 227: The lights going on and off’, Creed’s work takes many forms including music, talks and theatrical presentations. In ‘Work No. 1429, You’re the one for me’, Creed transports us to summer at the beach.

Series, sequences, variation and rhythm are often present in Creed’s work. Through very minimal interventions which treat all the elements equally, in a way letting materials speak for themselves. His stack paintings are achieved by using a set of flat brushes reducing in breadth from bottom to top to create pyramid shapes in multiple variations.

Creed makes no separation between his work and everyday life, between art galleries and the outside world. He is vegetarian and this can be seen in many of his works, including the broccoli bought at his local supermarket to create his broccoli paintings and the peanut butter toast sculptures, drawing on his time at a Buddhist monastery watching monks devour jars of peanut butter slathered on toast.

The phrase ‘Everything is going to be alright’ has been used by the artist in a series of large-scale neon works since 1999 and draws on the comforting words Creed was offered by a friend: ‘No one can really tell you everything is going to be alright, but despite that, many times in my life I have been very comforted by people saying something like that to me.’

Martin Creed, Work No. 790: EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE ALRIGHT, 2017. Installation view, MOCAD, Detroit MI

Jones, Jonathan, ‘Martin Creed’s stairway to heaven’, in: www.theguardian.co.uk, London/UK, 1 August 2011, ill. (on Work No. 1059)