Background

Michelle Lord is a visual artist whose work examines the complex relationships between literature, architecture and photography.

Recent work explores 'architectural fiction' as a way to interpret the communal, historic and built environment that surrounds us. Using literary narratives that propose differing perspectives on the concept of social utopia; I create photographs of constructed landscapes, buildings, streets or entire cities that refer to alternative architectural or geographical idylls. Flawed in their quest for perfection, these sites are often situated somewhere between disordered urban cityscape and alternative picture postcard, as models of utopia's 'gone awry' or plans for unconventional developments.

Perhaps not easily defined by a single visual language; my practice borrows from such diverse sources as design, animation, theatre, film and literature - presenting itself as a complex hybrid of sculpture, architecture and finally photography. Working non-digitally, my work represents a series of carefully hand-crafted illusions that seek to create an unerring depiction of a world which can only be understood from a single viewpoint - that of the camera.

Projects have been exhibited in the UK at venues including Elevator Gallery, London; Red Wire, Liverpool; Light House, Wolverhampton; MADE, Birmingham; Bristol Gallery and Inverness Museum & Art Gallery. Internationally, I have exhibited at the Australian Centre for Photography, Sydney; Centre for Contemporary Culture, Barcelona; Kaunas Museum, Lithuania; Galleri Image: Centre for Photography, Denmark; Fragaki Centre for Art & Design, Athens; School of Architecture and Urbanism, Romania and Baiyan Forest Park, China. In addition my work has been published in books and journals including Architectural Design, Dwell, Fotomagazin, Eyemazing, British Journal of Photography, Magazine Fotograf and Kinglux.

I have a broad range of experience within the arts, from practitioner to arts coordinator, workshop leader to lecturer - programming and delivering a wide variety of arts activities across a diverse range of creative platforms and projects. As a facilitator on the award nominated European photography project 'Re-Vision', I worked alongside participants from Ireland, Turkey, Finland, Germany and Romania; delivering workshops and co-curating a series of international exhibitions. Commissions and clients include English Heritage, Leicester Asian Youth Association, Solihull Art Gallery, Millenium Images, Herefordshire Council, 30 Bird Productions, Tom Dale Company and The Harry Benjamin Centre, Oslo. Other recent arts roles include Producer for Learning and Participation at MAC (Midlands Arts Centre) and Visual Art lecturer and coordinator on the BA (Hons) Art & Design course at Birmingham City University.