Michael Craig-Martin is widely considered to be one of the most influential artists and teachers of the past 50 years. His line drawings of objects from the modern world – made as paintings, prints, animations, or with tape directly onto the wall – are instantly recognisable. 

This large-scale painting on aluminium is in Craig-Martin’s hallmark flat, graphic style. Here, headphones, trainers and a trolley suitcase are depicted in the artist’s vibrant palette. Craig-Martin groups together ‘essential’ domestic items in his imagery, asking the viewer to consider the objects’ importance, how they relate to each other in space and – crucially – the relationship between the object and the image. In the artist’s words: ‘we often look for the special in special objects but actually, if we understood the quality of ordinary things, we are closer to the substance of life. We imbue a sense of profound personal engagement to objects we see as ours’.

As a tutor at Goldsmith's College from 1974–1988 and 1994–2000, Craig-Martin had a significant influence on two generations of now renowned young British artists. He has exhibited his work in solo museum exhibitions worldwide most recently at Chatsworth House, 2014 and the Hubei Museum of Art, Wuyan, China, 2015. His work is featured in various public collections, including MOMA, New York; Tate, London; and Centre Pompidou, Paris. Craig-Martin was elected as a Royal Academician in 2006. In 2016 he was knighted in the Queen’s Birthday Honours for his services to art. Craig-Martin lives and works in London.