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Keith Piper

Born, 1960 in Malta

Many biographical references to Keith Piper erroneously state that he was born in Birmingham. His place of birth was in fact Malta. Keith Piper’s work was included in the From Two Worlds exhibition at Whitechapel Art Gallery, 30 July - 7 September 1986. His work was included in the landmark exhibition The Other Story: Afro-Asian artists in post-war Britain, Hayward Gallery, London, 1989.

Keith Piper spoke at the Shades of Black conference held at Duke University, 19 - 22 April 2001. His paper, Wait, Did I Miss Something? Some Personal Musings on the 1980s and Beyond (part of The Thematics and Aesthetic Shifts in Practice Since the 1980s panel) is reproduced in Part One of the book Shades of Black, subtitled Assembling Black Arts in 1980s Britain. Likewise, Keith Piper’s work was included in the book Shades of Black: Assembling Black Arts in 1980s Britain.

Piper’s work was discussed and illustrated in Exiles, Diasporas & Strangers, one of four books in a series titled Annotating Art’s Histories, jointly published by The MIT Press, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts and iniva the Institute of International Visual Arts, London, published in 2008 and edited by Kobena Mercer. The chapter relating to Piper was Diaspora, Trauma and the Poetics of Remembrance, by Jean Fisher.

Several stills from Keith Piper’s works are reproduced in Gen Doy’s book, Black Visual Culture, I.B. Tauris, 2000.

Piper was one of over 60 artists whose work was included in Afro Modern, a major exhibition that took place at Tate Liverpool in the spring of 2010. The exhibition was accompanied by a major catalogue. Piper’s work was reproduced in the small visitor guide, issued by Tate Liverpool, that accompanied the exhibition. From the visitor guide:

Afro Modern: Journeys through the Black Atlantic, 29 January - 25 April 2010

As a port city, Liverpool has played an important role in the millions of journeys back and forth across the Atlantic. The city has been at the heart of cultural exchange for centuries making it the ideal location for Tate’s fascinating new exhibition, Afro Modern: Journeys through the Black Atlantic.

This thought-provoking exhibition identifies a new, hybrid culture that has arisen from the journeys made by people of Black African descent and is the first exhibition to trace in depth the impact of this new culture on art from the early twentieth century to today.

From Picasso to Man Ray, Kara Walker to Chris Ofili and Ellen Gallagher to Jean Michel Basquiat, this exhibition features a wide variety of artists and offers a fresh and alternative interpretation of their work for a new generation.

The cover of the visitor guide featured Glenn Ligon, Malcolm X [version 2] #1, 2000. The above text was accompanied by small reproductions of Candice Breitz, Ghost Series #4, 1994-6 and Keith Piper, Go West Young Man.

Piper’s website is www.keithpiper.info/