Cox, Lei

Lei Cox works with video installation, video art, performance-to-camera and photography and has shown his work worldwide since 1985. His work has often been described a surreal, humorous and science fictional. Cox began working with black and white photography, this was essentially shot straight and with no special effects where finding the unusual in everyday landscapes and portraits was the dominant theme. These early photographs were made with full-frame purity, dramatic light with high contrast and tonal exaggeration.

The work changed direction after considering experimentation with sandwich negatives in the enlarger, studio lighting work, filmmaking and video art and the vast possibilities of moving images and early digital video effects. Together with parallel interests in sound and music, video art and video installation became his main form of expression. Later utilizing digital broadcast quality production and post production equipment he began questioning the need for extensive compositing, the reliance of the computer and the over complication of some works which took up to two years to construct.

Major solo exhibitions have been shown in the Experimental Art Foundation, Adelaide, Centre for Contemporary Art, Glasgow, Laing Gallery, Newcastle and Gallery Rene Coelho, Amsterdam. Cox has also been exhibited in shows including Tel Aviv Museum of Art, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Skopje, Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Tate Gallery Liverpool, Osnabruck European Media Art Festival, His Single screen work has been shown in over 70 international festivals and he has recently completed an interactive camera obscura public artwork, The Dark Room: Mountain to Sea – Beyond Site which is situated on Cairngorm Mountain in Scotland.

updated April 2022

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