You suddenly find yourself alone in a destroyed world. The once familiar city has now been left lifeless in a derelict and eroded state. Humans are gone or killed. You have entered the semi-fictional world of mixed media artist, James Chadderton.
Manchester-based artist, James Chadderton, creates a series of images showing how popular landmark sites might look after an apocalypse. Maintaining a degree of realism, James draws the viewer into an alternative reality, where iconic, bright and sometimes playful areas are turned into something dark and macabre. Depicted in a derelict and eroded state, the cities have been left lifeless. Humans are gone or killed.
The viewer is entering a world of aggression where the urge to destroy is interwoven with confronting, calming and compelling feelings.
In James’ semi-fictional world, irony and cheerfulness meet fear of transience and death. It is precisely in the synthesis of these opposing, colliding worlds that the attraction of his work lies. James’ art is exposing the world and its complex, unspoken ways long before reality gets the chance to break it to us. Inspired by the nightmarish images of dystopian films and video games, the haunting post-apocalyptic landscapes, commenting on the vanity of human aspirations, let imagination run wild about the “how” and “why” questions.
About the artist
James Chadderton is a mixed media artist based in Manchester, UK. His work, consisting mostly of post-apocalyptic landscapes, collapses the boundaries between traditional and composite drawing. James’ drawing style is characterised by a tendency towards magic realism, or moments of fantasy within realistic portrayals. His playful, colourful, and at the same time dark and nightmarish landscapes open up possibilities within the space between reality and fiction, or intent and interpretation.
James’ art, by exposing the world and its complex, unspoken ways long before reality, forms an investigation into issues of human existence and aspirations. In his semi-fictional world, irony and cheerfulness meet fear of transience and death; and It is precisely in the synthesis of these opposing, colliding worlds that the attraction of his work lies.
Avid fan of post-apocalyptic films, science fiction, and video games, James has collaborated with EA at the Battlefield franchise as well as music legend Peter Hook at EP 1102/2011, and the BBC.
His work has been exhibited in Clifford Whitworth Library (Salford), Manchester Art Fair, Generation Gallery (nationwide), Incognito Gallery (Manchester), dot-art Gallery (Liverpool), and Jeffery-West (Manchester). In 2019, James won the People’s Choice Award with Liver Building, the first artwork of his post-apocalyptic Liverpool series commissioned for the Liverpool, 2028 exhibition (dot-art Gallery and Bido Lito).