Antony Micallef

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In the last two years Antony Micallef has become one of the most lauded artists. In Autumn 2008 he took part in the contemporary programme at the Royal Academy of Art, and 2007 saw sell-out shows in London and Los Angeles. At once colorfully beautiful and deeply troubling, Antony's work examines our dichotomous relationship with consumerism, examining how we can maintain to despise multi-national brands yet still allow ourselves to be seduced by them. "The trouble with pop imagery is that it doesn't really go deeper than the surface" he comments. "You have to drag it down and challenge it to make it interesting, marry contrasting emotions and motifs. The union of two opposites make an intriguing and strange chemistry." Described as "Caravaggio meets Manga" and "Bacon in Disneyland," this potent cocktail has seen Antony become enormously popular with collectors. Despite the popularity of his comparatively spartan "tortured head" series, and being runner-up in the National Portrait Gallery's BP/Amaco Portrait of the Year prize in 2000, Antony has always turned down commissions, insisting not only that he's a figurative painter, but that he could never see himself "inflicting such brutal emotions on somebody I didn't know." Hardcover, color.