About

Joshua Y’Barbo

PhD, MA, PgDip, BA

For over 20 years, I have practised studio art as a digital printmaker. Since 2013, I have taught undergraduate and postgraduate Art, Design, and Theatre students. I also conducted research in Art History, Theory, and Practice at the University of the Arts London, where I gained expertise in socially engaged, participatory art and design. I’m based in London, but I am active across the UK, Europe, the US and APAC.

Artist Statement

My studio work over the years reflects an impulse to piece things more significant than me together by combining my singular experience with uneasy collective guesswork about the world around us. I have followed postmodernity's use of visual allegory and personal metaphor as I create visual narratives that simultaneously represent my own experiences of the world and speculate how everything around me fits together. My most recent projects explore this ongoing existential crisis through simulation theory and nostalgia. As an artist and expert in participatory art and design, I have followed the principles that a new idea is a combination of old ideas and developing creative ideas or solutions to problems is about seeing and creating relationships. As a result, I have developed a process of techniques for creative problem-solving and producing unique ideas, which I use to create artwork and design art clubs.

  • PhD in Practice-led Research – Chelsea, Camberwell, Wimbledon Colleges, UAL (2013 – 2022).

  • MA in Fine Art – Chelsea College of Art, UAL (2009 – 2010).

  • Postgraduate Diploma in Fine Art – Chelsea College of Art, UAL (2008 – 2009).

  • Bachelor of Fine Art in Studio Art – Texas State University (2001 – 2005).

Education

Exhibitions

  • Poppet and Pop at Small House Gallery, London UK (2023).

  • ON FOOD, CONVIVIALITY AND CULTURES International Group Exhibition at Millepiani Rome, IT (2023).

  • 5th Annual PASA Festival, hosted at BitEden Space, Seoul; INTERPARK BlueSquare, Seoul; Lotte Center, Hanoi; LG Discovery Lab, Seoul; Incheon Airport, Incheon (Oct-Dec 2022).

  • Connectivité, Virtual Exhibition (Stay Connected) by The Huts Magazine, curated by Lois Emma Harkin (2021).

  • Discursivity at Chelsea College of Art, London, UK. (2021).

  • Curated: Team LEWIS Foundation Annual Emerging Artists Exhibition, Millbank Tower, London, UK (2021).

  • Curated: Team LEWIS Foundation Annual Emerging Artists Exhibition, Millbank Tower, London, UK. (2017- 2022).

  • Glitch at The Isherwood Gallery in the Old Courts, Wigan, UK (2017).

  • Curated: Team LEWIS Foundation Annual Emerging Artists Exhibition, Millbank Tower, London, UK (2017).

  • Parallax II at Chelsea College of Art, London, UK (2016).

  • Art Riot Exhibition at Chelsea College of Art, London, UK (2016).

  • Curated: Team LEWIS Foundation Annual Emerging Artists Exhibition, Millbank Tower, London, UK (2015 & 2016).

  • Curated: Beuys Keep Swinging, Landing Space, Chelsea College of Arts, London, UK (2014).

  • Curated: Watch the Second Hand at Chelsea College of Art, London, UK (2014).

  • Echo of Translation, La Salle College of Art, Singapore (2013).

  • Open Work, the Albert, Queen's Park, London UK (2013).

  • 1st Year PhD Exhibition at Chelsea College of Art & Design, London UK (2013).

  • For Display Purposes Only, Bussey Building, London, UK (2012).

  • Words to be Looked At, Chelsea College of Art & Design, London, UK (2012).

  • Curated: Dandyism of Contempt, Camden Town Unlimited, London, UK (2011).

  • No.1 Showroom at Men Can Not Live on Bread Alone, Whitechapel, London, UK (2010).

  • MA Final Exhibition at Chelsea College of Art & Design, London, UK (2010).

  • Reaching Inside, Phantom Art Galleries / Lark Gallery, Long Beach, CA. Curated Peter Frank - Critic for the Huffington Post, Senior Curator at the Riverside Art Museum, and former Editor of THE magazine, Los Angeles, CA, USA (2010).

  • Chasing Flames, Turn-Berlin, Berlin, DE (2009).

  • Invisible Means of Support at Club Row, the Rochelle School, London, UK (2009).

  • One Night Stands, Wimbledon College of Art and Design, London, UK (2009).

  • National Juried Monotype / Monoprint Exhibition, Attleboro Arts Museum, MA. Curated by Aprile Gallant, Curator - Prints, Drawings, and Photographs, Smith College, Museum of Art, MA (2008).

  • Curated: Beat: Photography & Films by Chris Felver at Bay10 Projects/Big Medium, Austin, TX (2008).

  • Open Show at Gallery 825, Los Angeles, CA. Curated by Howard N. Fox, Curator of Contemporary Arts, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (2007).

  • Off the Wall, Poissant Gallery, Houston, TX (2006).

  • Graduating Senior Thesis Exhibition, Texas State Galleries, San Marcos, TX (2005).

  • He Said/ She Said, FASA Spring Juried Exhibition. Gallery Lombardi, Austin, TX. Curated by Derek Boshier (2005).

Experience

  • Artist-in-Residence – Team LEWIS Foundation, London, UK (2016 – current).

  • Associate Lecturer – Chelsea, Camberwell, Wimbledon Colleges at University of the Arts London, UK (2013 – current).

  • Research Fellow in Co-Design – the University of Green, School of Design, UK (2021 – 2022).

  • Graduate Teaching Assistant – Camberwell, Chelsea, and Wimbledon Colleges, University of the Arts London, UK (2013-2021).

  • PhD Research Studentship - Kupambana Foundation, London, UK (2013 - 2020).

  • Chelsea Salon Director – Chelsea College of Art, University of the Arts London, UK (2009 - 2016).

  • Gallery Assistant – Robert Berman Gallery, Los Angeles, CA (2006 – 2008).

  • Studio Assistant – Derek Boshier, Los Angeles, CA (2006 – 2008).

  • Art Handler and Technician (2003-2005) at Texas State Galleries, Texas State University, San Marcos, TX, USA.

Publications, Conferences & Residencies

  • Artist in Development – London Creative Network at [Space], London (2022).

  • Digital Fatigue Workshop at Digital Research in the Humanities and Art (DRHA) Conference (2022).

  • Artist Profile in Artists Responding to (A.R.T.) Zine, issue 8 (2021). Available here.

  • Book Review of Leap into Action: Critical Performative Pedagogies in Art and Design Education edited for Art & the Public Sphere (Journal), volume 8.2 (2020). Available here.

  • Participating Member – Incidental Unit, Flat Time House, London (2016 – 2019).

  • Paper on The Materiality of Dialogue and research participant for Redefining the Social in Architecture: co-organised by the ICA, Birkbeck, and CHASE England, UK (2017 – 2018). Available here.

  • A Roadmap for Failure: Essay for Glitch: The Aesthetics of Failure (2017). You may find more details about the exhibition here.

  • Art Riot / Aftercare (2015). Available here.

  • Artist in Residence – ECHO: The Poetics of Translation at LASALLE College, Singapore (2013).

  • Artist in Residence – Serigraphy at Frans Masereel Centrum, Kasterlee, BE (2011)

Reviews

"Y'Barbo works with technical, technological, evidently computer-generated imagery, speaking of the way we try to quantify and even commodify our lives. But he doesn't argue against the computer's lack of humanity so much as he tries to humanise it, to bring it down – or up – to our scale."

-Peter Frank (2010), Critic for the Huffington Post, Senior Curator at the Riverside Art Museum, and former Editor of THE magazine, Los Angeles, California.

Funding

  • ·TEAM LEWIS Foundation fully funded PhD Research Scholarship (2013 – 2019).

  • McGehee Art Scholarship (2004 – 2005) for studio art painting.

  • Martin and Elizabeth Walling Turner Scholarship (2004 – 2005) for studio art painting

Collections

Commissioned works for the private collections of Susan and Mike Cunningham, Newport, RI, and Dr Richard Aycock, Memphis, TN.