Born in 1957 in Cape Town, South Africa.
Lives and works in Melbourne, Australia.
Born in Cape Town, Richard Butler-Bowdon’s ethos has been that of a citizen of the
world, and whether he is in the Sudan, Thailand, the Netherlands, or in his current
home in Melbourne, Australia, his utmost dedication is to art and the art community.
Fundamentally, his practice is an outcome of this open and non-hierarchical curiosity
in humanity.
Taking on the most formal and historical traditions of portraiture, Butler- Bowdon
challenges the viewer to break with these very conventions and presumptions that
accompany lofty tradition by taking his observations from those living in the diaspora.
His subjects are contra-historical; they are contemporary and undeniably compelling.
Far from the exotic, Butler- Bowdon’s paintings create magnetic and subversive
narratives that invite the viewer into the world of ‘the other’, to enter a dynamic gaze
that is defiant to preconceptions.
