By Lauren Beavis
A museum has announced the fist UK exhibition of internationally renowned artist and internet sensation Mr Doodle.
The selection of Mr Doodle’s personal sketchbooks, going back to his teenage years, will provide the starting point for a show that will fill the gallery and spread across the walls, floor and ceiling of the Holburne Museum, in Bath.
Sam Cox, aka Mr Doodle, said: “My intention has always been to create a universal doodle language that can relate to and attract people from all over the world.”
Primarily characterised by black ink on a white background, Mr Doodle’s graphic style conjures up a world of quirky creatures and anthropomorphic forms – using ink pens and spray paint to intricately weave together what he describes as “graffiti spaghetti”.
Mr Doodle began to garner recognition in the art world in 2015 and has since seen a meteoric rise in interest in his work.
He stands at the forefront of a new art wave, taking the online art community by storm with a mass social media following – his works provoke discourse on what we consider fine art today.
Sam’s work builds on the narrative of ‘DoodleLand’ – telling the story of Mr Doodle’s life and his doodle family, including his evil twin Mas (aka Dr Scribble) and the Anti-Doodle Squad who intervene in his attempts to achieve his ultimate mission to doodle over the entire planet.
Part of this mission includes doodle interventions that will appear throughout the museum’s permanent collection, temporarily replacing a number of paintings and decorative objects with doodled canvases and 3-D sculptures inspired by their surroundings.
These new works will open a dialogue between the museum’s historic collection and Mr Doodle’s distinctive drawing style, enabling visitors to see these artworks in an entirely new context.
Doodles will also pop up throughout the rest of the building, in unexpected places including in the lift and along the café windows.
The exhibition also spills into the wider city – as Mr Doodle has created new site-specific work to occupy some of the main thoroughfares, including Milsom Street and Union Street, phone boxs, bench seating and banners overhead.
Dr Chris Stephens, Director, Holburne Museum said: “At the Holburne we are working hard to present a wide and diverse range of artistic practice and I am delighted to be the first museum in the country to present the extraordinary world of Mr Doodle.”
For more information visit: https://www.holburne.org/
