"We’re constantly bombarded with faux realism and direct marketing through social media and contemporary means of advertising. My work aims to provide the viewer with an escape or a sense of solitude by reducing one’s environment to it’s most essential geometries - producing a universal language of shapes and hues that at their very core, are organic forms embedded within the fabric of the world around us."
Ted Collier (b. 1974) is an American contemporary artist and painter best known for his abstract works derived from observable patterns found in nature. Making references to minimalism and the De Stijl movement, Collier responds to the daily inundation of faux realism in the form of advertising and social media, reducing his environments to their essential forms and colors. Finding inspiration in the world around him, his paintings are influenced by abstractions of mental snapshots that have evolved over time - simplifying memories and experiences into geometric compositions that contain a universality within each piece.
Though Ted has been painting since his childhood, his career as an artist began in St Louis Missouri in 2008 after the financial crash and recession. Leaving behind a 15 year career in real estate and working odd end jobs in construction, he returned to art by sourcing materials such as plywood and extra house paint to create his first works and pop up exhibitions. Now representing a diverse portfolio, his paintings and various series range from subtle and monochromatic, to bold and vibrant. As a self taught artist, he has since opened his own studio and amassed placements in numerous private collections, galleries, and organizations.