The Harry Pye story
Harry was born in 1973 in London. He began making super 8 films and editing and publishing his own magazines at the age of 11. At primary school he was taught to draw by studying postcards a teacher had bought from the Tate Gallery bookshop. After getting his GCSEs and A' Levels at Crown Woods school he went onto complete a foundation course at Camberwell School of Art. From 1992 to 1995 he was a student at Winchester School of Art. In the second year of the course he did an artist's placement with the sculptor Bruce McLean.
When he returned to London in '95 he began publishing "Harry Pye's Frank Magazine" which lasted 5 years. In 2000 various artists including Gemma Shedden, Mat Humphrey, Peter Harris, Luke Gottelier and Francis Upritchard invited Harry to organise group shows in art spaces they had found. Exhibitions that Harry put together include "It May Be Rubbish, But It's British Rubbish", "Too Much Or Not Enough", "Viva Pablo" and "I'm Shy". It wasn't until the age of 30 that Harry began making paintings of his own. He was inspired to paint after seeing two exhibitions in 2004 - Phillip Guston at the Royal Academy and Mathias Kauage at the Horniman. Harry often made his work in collaboration with his friends Rowland Smith. Artist Jasper Joffe encouraged Harry to exhibit his work and introduced him to Gretta Sarfaty Marchant who ran Sartorial Contemporary Art (originally based in Notting Hill and then later Kings Cross.) Harry left the gallery in 2010 but he curated many shows there and had two successful solo shows at Sartorial: "Me, Me, Me" (Feb 2007) and "Getting Better" (March 2009). Harry's paintings have been exhibited all around the world. He has shown at the Thomas Cohn Gallery in Brazil, The Tom Christoffersen in Denmark, The Hell Gallery in Australia. When he's not painting Harry often works in collaboration with the film maker Gordon Beswick and their work has been screened at both Tate Britain and Tate Modern. Pye also collaborates with the artist Jasper Joffe on projects such as their 99p Art Shop. He has written for many magazines including Turps Banana, Epifiano, The Face and he is the editor of The Rebel. 
Harry Pye photographed by Wolfgang Tillmans and Wolfgang Tillmans photographed by Harry Pye (2003)
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Harry Pye, photo by Aleksandra Wojcik 2011
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