Ricky Lee Gordon

Works About Exhibitions

Ricky Lee Gordon C.V.
b. 1984

Lives and works in Bali and Sri Lanka
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2023 - TIDES, Times Beach Warung, Bali
2022 - The Ocean our Teacher of a Romantic Realism, The Slow, Bali
2015 - The Abstract and Absolute, Dangerfork Gallery, Melbourne
2015 - The Nature of Our Presence, Worldart Gallery, Cape Town
2012 - Ways of Seeing, A WORD OF ART Gallery, Cape Town
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2022 - Portals, group exhibition of past Śūnyatā artists-in-residence, MAIA Contemporary, Mexico City
2022 - The Ocean Our Teacher of a Romantic Realism, The Slow, Bali
2017 - Noa Noa, Martina’s Gallery, Milan
2017 - LADTW, Inner State Gallery, Detroit
2016 - Entry Point: Exploring the New Contemporary Movement, FullertonMuseum Center, California,
2016 - One Year Anniversary, Athen B Gallery, Oakland
2013 - Urban Art, DO ART Foundation, Los Angeles
COMMISSIONS
2023 - The Ocean Our Teacher Our Healer, United Nations, Houston
2018 - Horizon, Dubai Municipality, UAE
2018 - Waiting for Love in the Middle of the Sea/La Metamorphosis, Antonio
Oriente, Sapri, Italy
2018 - Sunrise. Sunset. We all share the same sun, Fund Sobranie Moscow, Satka,
Russia
2017 - Beautiful Orchestra, Live painting for Venice Family Clinic fundraiser, Google, Los Angeles
2016 - Migration, Bonobo album artwork
2016 - Edward Snowden: Three things cannot be long hidden, the sun, the moon
and the truth, Wright for Rights, Amnesty International, New Orleans
2016 - WAC Big Walls, Colombia College, Chicago
2016 - Anywhere, Everywhere, DO ART Foundation, Los Angeles
2014 - A Tribute to Nelson Mandela, Maboneng Precinct and the Nelson Mandela Foundation, Johannesburg
2014 - Google Doodle Freedom day, Google, Cape Town
2013 - Earth Hour, WWF, Cape Town & Johannesburg
2013 - Within the Wisdom of the Sands, 350.org Global Power Shift conference,
Istanbul
2013 - Moving Mountains, The Philadelphia Mural Art Program, Philadelphia
2012 - Kings and Castles Floating on Acrylic Mountains, Open Walls Festival, Baltimore
2012 - Untitled, Langa Township Experience, Cape Town
2012 - Acrylic Walls, Cape Town & Johannesburg
2011 - Untitled, Live Painting, Coachella music festival

Born in Johannesburg, South Africa in 1984, Ricky Lee Gordon is an artist and curator with a studio practice that sees him create natural landscapes on canvas using pigments and dyes found only in nature, a deeply personal process he likens to meditation for the manner in which it illuminates the interconnectedness of all life. Working under the aegis of painting nature with nature, he explores a variety of mediums, seeking harmony through the alchemy of materials and form in processes that include oxidising plant dyes, rock pigments, batik printing with beeswax, cyanotypes, lithographs, copper and acid engravings.

In his public practice, Lee Gordon is known as one of “street art’s 11 greats” (National Geographic) for his large-scale artworks highlighting social and environmental issues for organisations such as Amnesty International, Greenpeace, and the United Nations. Having moved to Cape Town in his twenties and founded A WORD OF ART Gallery, the Colour Ikamva school rejuvenation project and the Andpeople advertising agency, Lee Gordon went on to live in Los Angeles in 2015, where he studied anatomy, classical drawing and painting at the Los Angeles Academy of Figurative Art. With the ocean remaining an ever-present source of inspiration, Lee Gordon lived in Sri Lanka from 2016 to 2022, where he created the Śūnyatā artist residency. He is now based in Bali, Indonesia, where he founded SUN.CONTEMPORARY in 2024, a gallery and art advisory which nurtures and creates connections between the island’s creative community and the international art world.

rickyleegordon.com

CV