Bob and Roberta Smith

Patrick Brill (born 1963), better known by his pseudonym Bob and Roberta Smith, is a British contemporary artist, writer, author, musician, art education advocate, and keynote speaker. He is known for his "slogan" art, is an associate professor at the School of Art, Architecture and Design at London Metropolitan University and has curated public art projects such as Art U Need. He was curator for the 2006 Peace Camp and created the 2013 Art Party to promote contemporary art and advocacy. His works have been exhibited and are in collections in Europe and the United States. Brill co-founded The Ken Ardley Playboys and hosts the Make Your Own Damn Music radio show.

Life and work Patrick Brill is the son of landscape painter Frederick Brill (1920–1984), head of the Chelsea Art School from 1965 to 1979, and his wife, the artist Deirdre Borlase. He has a sister who is a psychiatric nurse, Roberta. He graduated from the University of Reading and received a scholarship during that time to The British School at Rome. He then obtained his Master of Arts at Goldsmiths College, London. also a contemporary artist and lecturer.

Brill was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2017 New Year Honours for services to the arts.

Careers

Art

Brill is commonly known as Bob and Roberta Smith in his artistic career.

Smith paints slogans in a brightly coloured lettering style on banners and discarded boards of wood and exhibits them in galleries of contemporary art across the world. The slogans are usually humorous musing on art, politics, popular culture, Britain and the world in general and they often support his activist campaigns, such as his 2002 amnesty on bad art at Pierogi Gallery, New York.

Noted for sign painting, Smith also makes sculpture using cement, as in his 2005 Cement Soup Kitchen at Beaconsfield Gallery, London. A sculpture he proposed was shortlisted for the fourth plinth in Trafalgar Square, London.

In March 2005, he was commissioned to curate a series of five public art projects in the Thames Gateway housing estates of Essex. The projects were collectively named Art U Need and were documented in a diary-format book by Smith in 2007. Writing of a launch event in "glittering Notting Hill Gate" (i.e. in fashionable and central Kensington), Lynn Barber said of Smith: "It was a startlingly unsuitable subject for such a glossy audience, but he held them spellbound. I see him as a sort of Ian Dury of the art world, someone who keeps on trucking, doing his own thing, making absolutely no concessions to fashion or marketability, but generally giving pleasure to everyone who comes across him."

In 2013, he was on the Museum of the Year selection panel. He is on the Tate board as an artist member. He created a project, the Art Party, in 2013 to make contemporary art more accessible, demonstrate its ability to influence meaningful conversation and political thought. It was launched at the Pierogi Gallery in New York and at the Hales Gallery. An Arts Council sponsored a two-day conference at Crescent Arts in North Yorkshire that year. It brought more than 2000 people who attended discussions of art education in schools and lectures, listened to music and attended performances.

Musician Brill performs music, often with a group he co-founded, The Ken Ardley Playboys,

2015 election Brill stood in the Surrey Heath constituency in the 2015 general election, under his working name, Bob and Roberta Smith. He won the fewest votes in the constituency, receiving 273 votes (0.5%) and losing his deposit. The seat was won by incumbent MP Michael Gove.

Collections Arts Council Collection, London British Council, London Goss Michael Foundation, Dallas, Texas Sammlung Fiede, Aschaffenburg, Germany Southampton City Museum & Art Gallery, Southampton, England Tate Collection, London The New Art Gallery Walsall, Walsall, UK

Published works Author

Co-author