BIO

b. 1965, Pensacola, FL
Lives in Atlanta, GA

Richard Russell was born in Pensacola Florida, where he began making collages in elementary school. Following two years at Florida School of the Arts in Palatka, Florida, and with his eyes set on a future in Graphic Design, he migrated to the Atlanta College of Art. Upon being advised by a faculty member that the fine arts had no place in design, he abandoned his ad agency goals to find passion in other mediums and finally graduated with a BFA in Photography in 1990. (Ironically, he has been a graphic designer for the past decade.) Through out his career as an artist, he has continued to work in various combinations of collage, photography, and artists’ book formats. In 1992, Mr. Russell published Insomnia at Nexus Press as a tribute to a friend who died of an overdose. Several self-published titles followed, including Anodyne (1991-93), a large-format Xerox chapbook, and Garden (1994), a not-to-be-bound wall-book which was also the basis for his first solo exhibition, by the same title, at New Visions Gallery. Regardless the medium, a sense of narrative story telling has always been a major component of his aesthetic, and continues still. As a maker of books, he is naturally fascinated by the rapid decline of this object as both a vehicle of communication and an art form. Likewise, he is an avid collector of vintage books, specifically those to which time or readers have not been kind, and these derelicts find new life in his art work.

Mr. Russell’s earliest exhibits include some of the first shows to be held at the Atlanta Photography Gallery, including “11: An Exhibit of 11 Atlanta Photographers” curated by Nancy Marshall, as well as many juried student shows and solo exhibits in the dearly departed Gallery 100 space at ACA. He has since exhibited in solo and group shows across the U.S. and Europe. His work is part of major venues including the Museum of Modern Art in New York, Virginia Commonwealth University, the New York Public Library, and the Sackner Collection of Visual and Concrete Poetry in Miami, as well as many private collections around the world. He was a very active member of the guerilla-art group Fotografitti. Recently, Mr. Russell has had two solo shows (Garage Projects and Gallery Stokes) and was honored to be selected one of the Top Five Finalists for the Forward Arts Foundation’s Emerging Artist of the Year Award and as a Fellow at the Hambidge Center for Arts and Sciences. Upcoming exhibits include a group show in Sweden as well as several Atlanta-area shows. His curatorial and arts administration experience includes 2 years as Assistant Director of the ACA Gallery and 2 years as Director of the Bizarre Bizzoso at the Atlanta Arts Festival.