Garry Fabian Miller (Bristol, UK 1957 -)
About
“The pictures I make are of something as yet unseen, which may only exist on the paper surface, or subsequently may be found in the world. I am seeking a state of mind which lifts the spirit, gives strength and a moment of clarity.”
Garry Fabian Miller, Homeland, Dartmoor, 2009
Garry Fabian Miller was born in Bristol in 1957. In 1974 he undertook an intensive study of the remote island community of the Shetlands, an experience that strengthened his interest in rural communities, and his developing ideas about the potential of an artist’s life lived outside the mainstream of metropolitan culture. The importance of place has since become a predominant theme and was at the heart of his first major body of work Sections of England: The Sea Horizon in 1976: forty photographs taken from a fixed point on the roof of his home overlooking the Severn Estuary in which the photographic elements of lens and film and exposure remained constant so that the only change from frame to frame was in the time of day and the weather. The cumulative series presents a powerful study of time and place and were first shown as part of the Midland Open Exhibition at London’s Serpentine Gallery in 1977 and in a fuller form in his first solo exhibition at the Arnolfini Gallery in Bristol in 1979.
In 1980, Fabian Miller moved to Lowfield Farm in a remote corner of Lincolnshire and since 1984 he has worked without a camera, using the techniques of early nineteenth century photographic exploration to experiment with the nature and possibilities of light as both medium and subject. Since 1992 he has explored a more abstract form of picture-making by passing light through coloured glass and liquid and cut paper forms. In parallel he has explored the ideas of exposure, the quantities of light that are required to make things visible, or invisible, in the making of a picture. In sharp contrast to the photographic norm of exposures that last for a fragment of a second, Fabian Miller’s work tends towards long exposures lasting anywhere between one and fifteen hours. These unusual methods create alternative, luminous realities that shift from pure abstraction to imagined landscapes of the mind and the resulting pictures have tended to appear from the studio in series, each image leading to the next.
Amongst the most notable of these series are Sons & Angels, exhibited at Yokohama Museum of Art, Japan 1995, and Museet fur Fotokunst, Odense, Denmark, 1996; Petworth Windows, exhibited Petworth House, West Sussex, 1999 and Cleveland Museum and Art Gallery, Ohio, USA, 2004; Toward a Solar Eclipse, exhibited Tate St Ives, 1999; Thoughts of a Night Sea, exhibited Tate Liverpool, 2001; Burning, exhibited Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield, 2002; Night Towers, exhibited Nichido Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan 2002; Becoming Magma, exhibited Victoria and Albert Museum, London, 2005; and Exposure, exhibited Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh 2005.
As these various series evolved so did their scale and complexity: the finished pictures often forming large grids made up of several connected elements. In 2006, partly as a reaction against the physical and technical challenges of these composite works, and partly in response to the threat posed to his methods by the digital age (specifically the demise of light sensitive Cibachrome paper) Miller began an intense period of working on a smaller scale. Referred to as Year One and Year Two – this period of free experiment collated his accumulated knowledge into a body of work that presented a pattern book of ideas for the future.
Garry Fabian Miller, Homeland, Dartmoor, 2009
Garry Fabian Miller was born in Bristol in 1957. In 1974 he undertook an intensive study of the remote island community of the Shetlands, an experience that strengthened his interest in rural communities, and his developing ideas about the potential of an artist’s life lived outside the mainstream of metropolitan culture. The importance of place has since become a predominant theme and was at the heart of his first major body of work Sections of England: The Sea Horizon in 1976: forty photographs taken from a fixed point on the roof of his home overlooking the Severn Estuary in which the photographic elements of lens and film and exposure remained constant so that the only change from frame to frame was in the time of day and the weather. The cumulative series presents a powerful study of time and place and were first shown as part of the Midland Open Exhibition at London’s Serpentine Gallery in 1977 and in a fuller form in his first solo exhibition at the Arnolfini Gallery in Bristol in 1979.
In 1980, Fabian Miller moved to Lowfield Farm in a remote corner of Lincolnshire and since 1984 he has worked without a camera, using the techniques of early nineteenth century photographic exploration to experiment with the nature and possibilities of light as both medium and subject. Since 1992 he has explored a more abstract form of picture-making by passing light through coloured glass and liquid and cut paper forms. In parallel he has explored the ideas of exposure, the quantities of light that are required to make things visible, or invisible, in the making of a picture. In sharp contrast to the photographic norm of exposures that last for a fragment of a second, Fabian Miller’s work tends towards long exposures lasting anywhere between one and fifteen hours. These unusual methods create alternative, luminous realities that shift from pure abstraction to imagined landscapes of the mind and the resulting pictures have tended to appear from the studio in series, each image leading to the next.
Amongst the most notable of these series are Sons & Angels, exhibited at Yokohama Museum of Art, Japan 1995, and Museet fur Fotokunst, Odense, Denmark, 1996; Petworth Windows, exhibited Petworth House, West Sussex, 1999 and Cleveland Museum and Art Gallery, Ohio, USA, 2004; Toward a Solar Eclipse, exhibited Tate St Ives, 1999; Thoughts of a Night Sea, exhibited Tate Liverpool, 2001; Burning, exhibited Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield, 2002; Night Towers, exhibited Nichido Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan 2002; Becoming Magma, exhibited Victoria and Albert Museum, London, 2005; and Exposure, exhibited Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh 2005.
As these various series evolved so did their scale and complexity: the finished pictures often forming large grids made up of several connected elements. In 2006, partly as a reaction against the physical and technical challenges of these composite works, and partly in response to the threat posed to his methods by the digital age (specifically the demise of light sensitive Cibachrome paper) Miller began an intense period of working on a smaller scale. Referred to as Year One and Year Two – this period of free experiment collated his accumulated knowledge into a body of work that presented a pattern book of ideas for the future.
Exhibition
Selected Solo Exhbitions
2010 Garry Fabian Miller, HackelBury Fine Art, London, UK
2009 The Colours, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh UK. Time Passage, Abbot Hall, Kendall, UK
2008 Authentic Tidings of Invisible Things, An Tobar, Isle of Mull, UK . The Years, Nichido Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
Year One, Newlyn Art Gallery, Newlyn, UK
2007-8 Year One, New Art Centre, Salisbury, UK
2007 Garry Fabian Miller and Edmund de Waal, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK
2006 Garry Fabian Miller, Goss Gallery, Dallas, USA
2005 Becoming Magma, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK. Real in the World, Mead Gallery, University of Warwick (touring)
Galerie Nichido, Paris, France. Exposure, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK. Rencontres d’Arles, International Festival of Photography, Arles, France
2004 Tracing Light, The Cleveland Museum of Arts, USA. Northern Suns Golden Storms, Nichido Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
Blue, Gold, Hamiltons, London, UK. Imagined, Portfolio Group, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
2003 Golden Storms, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK. Burning, Thought of a Night Sea, Valentina Moncada, Rome, Italy
2002 Flair, Tokyo Design Centre, Nichido Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan. Golden Burning, Night Cities, Purdy Hicks, London, UK
Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield, UK
2001 Petworth Windows, Purdy Hicks, London, UK. Gallery Camera Work, Berlin, Germany
2000 Thought of a Night Sea, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK. Solar Eclipse, Bernard Toale Gallery, Boston, USA
Six Chapel row Contemporary Art, Bath, UK
1999 Towards a Solar Eclipse, Tate, St Ives, UK. Tracing Light, Petworth House, Sussex, UK
1998 In the Shadow of the Sun, Hamiltons Gallery, London, UK. Sections of England: The Sea Horizon, Valentina Moncada, Rome, Italy
1997 De La War Pavilion, Bexhill-on-Sea, Sussex, UK. Sections of England: The Sea Horizon, Arnolfini, Bristol, UK
Sections of England: The Sea Horizon, Michael Hue Williams Fine Art, London, UK
1996 Elective Affinities, Michael Hue Williams Fine Art, London, UK. Of Sons and Angels, Museet for Fotokunst, Odense, Denmark
1995 Observances, The Pier Gallery, Orkney, UK
1994 Dawn, Yokohama Museum of Art, Japan. Natural Mechanics, Laurence Miller Gallery, New York, USA
1993 Home Land, Rebecca Hossack, St James’s, London, UK. Illumine, The Photographers Gallery, London (touring)
1991/3 The Gatherer, John Hansard Gallery, Southampton, UK (touring) – Newlyn Art Gallery, Penzance; Mead Gallery, University of Warwick, Cambridge Darkroom; Stills Gallery, Edinburgh, UK
1988 A Gathering in for the Healing, Natural History Museum, London, UK
1987 The Tree: A Return to Grace, Usher Gallery, Lincoln, UK
1986 Man from Hunter to Gatherer, Axiom, Cheltenham, UK [touring] - Impressions, York,
UK; Watershed, Bristol, UK
1985 Untitled Gallery, Sheffield, UK
1984 Festival Gallery, Bath, Usher Gallery, Arnolfini, Bristol, UK
Selected Group Exhibitions
2010 Shadow Catchers, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK.
Photography Now: vision, devotion, revelation, HackelBury Fine Art, London, UK
2009 Photography Now, HackelBury Fine Art, London, UK
2008 Photography Now, HackelBury Fine Art, London, UK
2007-8 The Long View: Garry Fabian Miller, Edmund de Waal, Michael Kenna; New Art Centre, Roche Court, UK.
2007 Photography Now, HackelBury Fine Art, London, UK
2006-7 Alchemy, Harewood House, Leeds (touring)
2005 Rencontres d'Arles, International Festival of Photography, Arles, France
2004 Lightfall, Philips Gallery, Taunton, UK. From Here to Eternity: Vija Celmins, Susan Derges, Richard Long, Garry Fabian Miller, James Turrell; Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK
Seeing Salvation Now, North Light Gallery, Huddersfield, UK
2003 Optic Nerve, Abstract Colour Photographer, Wolsey Art Gallery, UK; Christchurch Mansion, Ipswich; Photofusion, London, UK
2002 Four Photographers, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK
2001 At Sea, Tate Liverpool, UK. Planet Earth, City Art Gallery, Leicester, UK
2000 Unique Photographers, Paul Kasmin Gallery, New York, USA. Chorus of Light: Photographs from the Sir Elton John Collection, The High Museum of Art, Atlanta, USA. Breathless: Photography and Time, Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK
1999 Revelation, Purdy Hicks Gallery, London, UK. A Focus for Prayer, Six Chapel Row Contemporary Art, Bath, UK
1998 Several Exceptionally Good Recently Acquired Pictures XII, Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco, USA
1997 Several Exceptionally Good Recently Acquired Pictures XI, Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco, USA
1996-7 The Inner Eye, South Bank Centre, London, UK
1996 Under the Sun, Fraenkel Gallery, USA
1995 Heaven’s Embroidered Cloths, National Museum of Film, Photography & Television, Bradford, UK. 20 Modern British Photographers, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK. Context and Continuity, Newlyn Art Gallery, Penzance, UK
1994 Illumine, The Verula Monastery, Tarrazona, Spain
1993 New Inhabitants, Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter, UK. An Undiscovered Country, Rebecca Hossack Gallery, London, UK
1992-4 Special Collections, The Photographic Order from Pop to Now, International Centre of Photography, New York, (touring)
1990 The Journey, Lincoln Cathedral, UK. Collecting for the Future: A Decade of Contemporary Acquisitions, Victoria & Albert
Museum, London, UK
1989-93 Anima Mundi, Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography, Canada
1989-90 New Icons, Mead Gallery, University of Warwick, UK. The Tree of Life, South Bank Centre, London (touring)
1989 Out of the Wood, Crafts Council of Great Britain (touring). Towards a Bigger Picture, Tate, Liverpool, UK. Artists in National Parks, Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK. Photo Sculpture, Watershed, Bristol, UK
1987-8 Knowing Your Place, Artists; Parish Maps, Common Ground (touring)
1987 Towards a Bigger Picture, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK
1986-7 Image and Exploration, The Photographers Gallery, London (touring)
Land Matters, (touring), The Elements, Milton Keynes Exhibition Gallery, UK
Selected public collections
Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris, France
British Land Company, London, UK
Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio, USA
Conoco PLC
Deutsche Morgan Grenfell
Devon Country Art Collection, UK
The Fogg Art Museum, Boston, USA
The Gillman Collection, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA
Goldman Sachs
Goss-Michael Foundation
Government Art Collection, UK
Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield, UK
Hiscox PLC
Houston Museum of Fine Arts, USA
Sir Elton John Collection
Museet for Fotokunst, Odense, Denmark
Kasama Nichido Museum of Art, Tokyo, USA
National Museum of Film, Photography & Television, Bradford, UK
National Trust Foundation for Art, UK
National Westminster Bank Collection, London, UK
Pier Arts Centre, Stromness, Orkney, UK
Prendimi, Japan
Queen Alice Aqua
University of Warwick, UK
Usher Gallery, Lincoln, UK
Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK
Bibliography
2010 The Colour of Time, Black Dog Publishing, London
2008 Time Passage, Garry Fabian Miller, James Hyman Fine Art, London
2007 Year One, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh
2006 Exposure, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh
2005 Illumine, Martin Barnes, Merrell Publishers Ltd, London
2003 Thoughts of a Night Sea: Photographs by Garry Fabian Miller, Lavinia Greenlaw, Merrel Publishers Ltd
2001 Tracing Light, David Alan Mellor, Garry Fabian Miller, Photo Works
1997 Under the Sun, Christopher Bucklow, Susan Derges, Garry Fabian Miller, Adam Fuss,Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco
1991 The Gatherer - Garry Fabian Miller, Rupert Martin, John Hansard Gallery, Southampton
2010 Garry Fabian Miller, HackelBury Fine Art, London, UK
2009 The Colours, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh UK. Time Passage, Abbot Hall, Kendall, UK
2008 Authentic Tidings of Invisible Things, An Tobar, Isle of Mull, UK . The Years, Nichido Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
Year One, Newlyn Art Gallery, Newlyn, UK
2007-8 Year One, New Art Centre, Salisbury, UK
2007 Garry Fabian Miller and Edmund de Waal, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK
2006 Garry Fabian Miller, Goss Gallery, Dallas, USA
2005 Becoming Magma, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK. Real in the World, Mead Gallery, University of Warwick (touring)
Galerie Nichido, Paris, France. Exposure, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK. Rencontres d’Arles, International Festival of Photography, Arles, France
2004 Tracing Light, The Cleveland Museum of Arts, USA. Northern Suns Golden Storms, Nichido Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
Blue, Gold, Hamiltons, London, UK. Imagined, Portfolio Group, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
2003 Golden Storms, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK. Burning, Thought of a Night Sea, Valentina Moncada, Rome, Italy
2002 Flair, Tokyo Design Centre, Nichido Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan. Golden Burning, Night Cities, Purdy Hicks, London, UK
Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield, UK
2001 Petworth Windows, Purdy Hicks, London, UK. Gallery Camera Work, Berlin, Germany
2000 Thought of a Night Sea, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK. Solar Eclipse, Bernard Toale Gallery, Boston, USA
Six Chapel row Contemporary Art, Bath, UK
1999 Towards a Solar Eclipse, Tate, St Ives, UK. Tracing Light, Petworth House, Sussex, UK
1998 In the Shadow of the Sun, Hamiltons Gallery, London, UK. Sections of England: The Sea Horizon, Valentina Moncada, Rome, Italy
1997 De La War Pavilion, Bexhill-on-Sea, Sussex, UK. Sections of England: The Sea Horizon, Arnolfini, Bristol, UK
Sections of England: The Sea Horizon, Michael Hue Williams Fine Art, London, UK
1996 Elective Affinities, Michael Hue Williams Fine Art, London, UK. Of Sons and Angels, Museet for Fotokunst, Odense, Denmark
1995 Observances, The Pier Gallery, Orkney, UK
1994 Dawn, Yokohama Museum of Art, Japan. Natural Mechanics, Laurence Miller Gallery, New York, USA
1993 Home Land, Rebecca Hossack, St James’s, London, UK. Illumine, The Photographers Gallery, London (touring)
1991/3 The Gatherer, John Hansard Gallery, Southampton, UK (touring) – Newlyn Art Gallery, Penzance; Mead Gallery, University of Warwick, Cambridge Darkroom; Stills Gallery, Edinburgh, UK
1988 A Gathering in for the Healing, Natural History Museum, London, UK
1987 The Tree: A Return to Grace, Usher Gallery, Lincoln, UK
1986 Man from Hunter to Gatherer, Axiom, Cheltenham, UK [touring] - Impressions, York,
UK; Watershed, Bristol, UK
1985 Untitled Gallery, Sheffield, UK
1984 Festival Gallery, Bath, Usher Gallery, Arnolfini, Bristol, UK
Selected Group Exhibitions
2010 Shadow Catchers, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK.
Photography Now: vision, devotion, revelation, HackelBury Fine Art, London, UK
2009 Photography Now, HackelBury Fine Art, London, UK
2008 Photography Now, HackelBury Fine Art, London, UK
2007-8 The Long View: Garry Fabian Miller, Edmund de Waal, Michael Kenna; New Art Centre, Roche Court, UK.
2007 Photography Now, HackelBury Fine Art, London, UK
2006-7 Alchemy, Harewood House, Leeds (touring)
2005 Rencontres d'Arles, International Festival of Photography, Arles, France
2004 Lightfall, Philips Gallery, Taunton, UK. From Here to Eternity: Vija Celmins, Susan Derges, Richard Long, Garry Fabian Miller, James Turrell; Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK
Seeing Salvation Now, North Light Gallery, Huddersfield, UK
2003 Optic Nerve, Abstract Colour Photographer, Wolsey Art Gallery, UK; Christchurch Mansion, Ipswich; Photofusion, London, UK
2002 Four Photographers, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh, UK
2001 At Sea, Tate Liverpool, UK. Planet Earth, City Art Gallery, Leicester, UK
2000 Unique Photographers, Paul Kasmin Gallery, New York, USA. Chorus of Light: Photographs from the Sir Elton John Collection, The High Museum of Art, Atlanta, USA. Breathless: Photography and Time, Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK
1999 Revelation, Purdy Hicks Gallery, London, UK. A Focus for Prayer, Six Chapel Row Contemporary Art, Bath, UK
1998 Several Exceptionally Good Recently Acquired Pictures XII, Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco, USA
1997 Several Exceptionally Good Recently Acquired Pictures XI, Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco, USA
1996-7 The Inner Eye, South Bank Centre, London, UK
1996 Under the Sun, Fraenkel Gallery, USA
1995 Heaven’s Embroidered Cloths, National Museum of Film, Photography & Television, Bradford, UK. 20 Modern British Photographers, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK. Context and Continuity, Newlyn Art Gallery, Penzance, UK
1994 Illumine, The Verula Monastery, Tarrazona, Spain
1993 New Inhabitants, Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter, UK. An Undiscovered Country, Rebecca Hossack Gallery, London, UK
1992-4 Special Collections, The Photographic Order from Pop to Now, International Centre of Photography, New York, (touring)
1990 The Journey, Lincoln Cathedral, UK. Collecting for the Future: A Decade of Contemporary Acquisitions, Victoria & Albert
Museum, London, UK
1989-93 Anima Mundi, Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography, Canada
1989-90 New Icons, Mead Gallery, University of Warwick, UK. The Tree of Life, South Bank Centre, London (touring)
1989 Out of the Wood, Crafts Council of Great Britain (touring). Towards a Bigger Picture, Tate, Liverpool, UK. Artists in National Parks, Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK. Photo Sculpture, Watershed, Bristol, UK
1987-8 Knowing Your Place, Artists; Parish Maps, Common Ground (touring)
1987 Towards a Bigger Picture, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK
1986-7 Image and Exploration, The Photographers Gallery, London (touring)
Land Matters, (touring), The Elements, Milton Keynes Exhibition Gallery, UK
Selected public collections
Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris, France
British Land Company, London, UK
Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio, USA
Conoco PLC
Deutsche Morgan Grenfell
Devon Country Art Collection, UK
The Fogg Art Museum, Boston, USA
The Gillman Collection, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA
Goldman Sachs
Goss-Michael Foundation
Government Art Collection, UK
Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield, UK
Hiscox PLC
Houston Museum of Fine Arts, USA
Sir Elton John Collection
Museet for Fotokunst, Odense, Denmark
Kasama Nichido Museum of Art, Tokyo, USA
National Museum of Film, Photography & Television, Bradford, UK
National Trust Foundation for Art, UK
National Westminster Bank Collection, London, UK
Pier Arts Centre, Stromness, Orkney, UK
Prendimi, Japan
Queen Alice Aqua
University of Warwick, UK
Usher Gallery, Lincoln, UK
Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK
Bibliography
2010 The Colour of Time, Black Dog Publishing, London
2008 Time Passage, Garry Fabian Miller, James Hyman Fine Art, London
2007 Year One, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh
2006 Exposure, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh
2005 Illumine, Martin Barnes, Merrell Publishers Ltd, London
2003 Thoughts of a Night Sea: Photographs by Garry Fabian Miller, Lavinia Greenlaw, Merrel Publishers Ltd
2001 Tracing Light, David Alan Mellor, Garry Fabian Miller, Photo Works
1997 Under the Sun, Christopher Bucklow, Susan Derges, Garry Fabian Miller, Adam Fuss,Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco
1991 The Gatherer - Garry Fabian Miller, Rupert Martin, John Hansard Gallery, Southampton