Contemporary graffiti artist Anthony Lister is considered Australia’s premier street artist. Born in Brisbane in 1979, Lister pioneered the street art movement in his home city, before studying at the Queensland College of Art. In 2002, he travelled to New York, where he worked with acclaimed artist Max Gimblett, to develop what has become his signature aesthetic: a blurring of high and low cultural references, in a sketchy, figurative style. Today, Lister works with a variety of media, incorporating charcoal, acrylic, spray paint, and oil into his original artworks, as well as producing limited edition prints and etchings. “The first rule of painting,” Lister has said, “is to take everyone else out of the equation. I am the viewer, so I don’t underestimate my viewers. They see everything and I just have to assume that they are me. I can’t paint for anyone else.” As such, his work retains a dreamy quality, a twenty-first century model of art-for-art’s sake, which enjoys an anti-referential reliance on sheer beauty. Lister has exhibited at the New Image Art Gallery in Los Angeles, Robert Fontaine Gallery in Miami, and Black Art Projects in Melbourne. He currently lives and works in Sydney, Australia. Contemporary graffiti artist Anthony Lister is considered Australia’s premier street artist. Born in Brisbane in 1979, Lister pioneered the street art movement in his home city, before studying at the Queensland College of Art. In 2002, he travelled to New York, where he worked with acclaimed artist Max Gimblett, to develop what has become his signature aesthetic: a blurring of high and low cultural references, in a sketchy, figurative style. Today, Lister works with a variety of media, incorporating charcoal, acrylic, spray paint, and oil into his original artworks, as well as producing limited edition prints and etchings. “The first rule of painting,” Lister has said, “is to take everyone else out of the equation. I am the viewer, so I don’t underestimate my viewers. They see everything and I just have to assume that they are me. I can’t paint for anyone else.” As such, his work retains a dreamy quality, a twenty-first century model of art-for-art’s sake, which enjoys an anti-referential reliance on sheer beauty. Lister has exhibited at the New Image Art Gallery in Los Angeles, Robert Fontaine Gallery in Miami, and Black Art Projects in Melbourne. He currently lives and works in Sydney, Australia.
