| BIOGRAPHY
ADRIAN DOYLE is a Melbourne-based artist best known for his paintings, murals, installations and large-scale public artworks. Growing up in Frankston, Doyle began his art life scribbling on trains, playing in drains and exploring abandoned buildings. When he began art school he set up his first studio in 1996 in Prahran. In 2001 as he was finishing his MFA at VCA, and was lucky enough to acquire the lease for 110 Franklin Street, Melbourne. This became the home of The Blender Studios for the next 16 years, and it was here that the foundations for both the Melbourne street art scene and Doyle’s own art career were laid.
The Blender Studios has been influential in the changing cultural landscape of Melbourne’s urban art movement, remaining as one of the last independent large-scale studios left in the CBD. Over the last 16 years, Doyle has played a key role in the Australian fine art and street art scene with his work extending from solo exhibitions to large-scale commissioned public art and installations
With many major awards under his belt, including The Martin Bequest, Australia Council, The Pratt Family; Doyle has exhibited internationally and is in public and private collections worldwide, including The National Gallery of Australia and VCA
Currently completing his PhD on the impact that urban art has made on the fine art scene in Melbourne, he has enabled and supported young and emerging artists who have opted to skip traditional methods of learning such as University, and instead learn from established artists at Blender. This has had an incredible success rate with many artists forging strong art practices as a result.
In 2012, ABC’s Artscape screened Subtopia, a two-part documentary that profiled Doyle and his unusual lifestyle. A documentary that the artist himself created, it was an artwork in the medium of suburbia, that of TV. He also controversially painted the whole of Rutledge Lane ‘Empty Nursery Blue’. ‘I just wanted it to look like a giant empty swimming pool’ professed Doyle, who reclaimed the iconic shade of blue as his visual identity or ‘tag’. It lasted 1 hour, took 250 litres of paint, two generators, spray guns and a scissor lift, was featured in the New York Times and BBC, and to this day, still polarises both the fine art community and the street art and graffiti community.
Academic Qualifications:
Candidate PhD (3rd & Final Year) (Victoria University)
Masters by research (Victorian College of the Arts)
BFA (Honours) Victorian College of the Arts
BFA (Painting) Monash University
Public art projects:
2021 Surrey Hills Primary School
2021 Nunawading Community Hub (100m mural)
2021 'Britannia Mall Botanicals,'
2020 ‘Sweet Grevillea’, Whitehorse City Council Mural, Box Hill Centre
2020 Augathella Water Tower Mural, Augathella (QLD)
2019 Big Picture Festival Mural, Frankston
2018 ‘Marvel Mural’ Literature Lane, Melbourne
2018 Monash Freeway Upgrade Mural, Melbourne
2017 ‘Play Me I’m Yours’, public piano project with Arts Centre Melbourne
2017 ‘100 years of war in Belgium’ Belgium Interior
2016 ‘Facebook office’ Melbourne
2014 ‘Public art’ ‘Love your Laneways’ Flinders Court
2014 ‘Living the Dream’ St Kilda, Melbourne
2013 ‘Sacrifice’ Docklands, Melbourne
2013 ‘Empty Nursery Blue Laneway’ Rutledge lane, Melbourne
2013 ‘The Dream’ Public art work in Hawthorn, Melbourne
2012 Kingsway mural (50m mural on the crown promenade)
2012 Curator of major laneways in Melbourne – commissioned by the city of Melbourne
2011 Yarra Housing Association: Interactive mural: Cambridge Street Collingwood
2010-11 Post Office Lane: Rejuvenation of laneway with mosaic, mural, sculpture: Richmond
2009 Nobody wall (faces wall) Curated a collaborative mural: Brunswick street. Fitzroy
2009 Fire Union Project: managed a major art project to celebrate 100 years of the union. Fitzroy
2008 Citylink Project: Made public art in the freeway structure: South Yarra
2007 Billboard Project: Made up a collaborative billboard, Bridge Rd, Richmond
Selected Solo Exhibitions:
2018 ‘You Are All The Same’ Dark Horse Experiment, Melbourne
2016 ‘Suburbia’ Dark Horse Experiment, Melbourne
2014 ‘Never Forget to remember’ Dark Horse Experiment, Melbourne
2013 ‘Empty Nursery Blue Lane’ Melbourne
2012 ‘Australian Landscape’Dark Horse Experiment, Melbourne
2011 ‘You are all the same’ Dark Horse Experiment, Melbourne
2011 ‘Relaunch of Martin Bequest’ Art Gallery of NSW
2010 ‘New Australian Landscapes’ Michael Koro Galleries Melbourne
2010 ‘the Mirror Room’ Michael Koro Galleries Melbourne
2009 ‘New Australian Landscapes’ Michael Koro Galleries, Melbourne
2008 ‘Suburbania’ Edwina Collette Gallery, Brisbane
2007 ‘I still call Australia home’ Gadfly Gallery Perth
2006 ‘Suburban Jihad’ Gadfly Gallery Perth
2005 ‘Living in Paradise’ Rex Livington fine art. Sydney
2004 ‘When I Grow up’ Bus Gallery, Melbourne
2004 ‘Hide and Seek’ Smyrnios Gallery, Melbourne
2004 ‘Suburban Beasts’ Gadfly Gallery, Perth
2003 ‘SHRINE’ National College of Arts, Lahore, Pakistan
2003 ‘The Playing Fields’ Fortyfivedownstairs, Melbourne
2002 ‘Suburban Myth’ West Space Inc, Melbourne
2002 ‘SHRINE performance’ Linden Gallery, St Kilda, Melbourne
2002 ‘Third Avenue’ Red Gallery Inaugural Show, Melbourne
2001 ‘Iconography of Nostalgia’ Linden Gallery, St Kilda, Melbourne
2001 ‘The Open Gate and the Water Tower’ Linden Gallery, St Kilda
Selected Group Exhibitions:
2016 ‘Quarter Acre’ Blindside, Melbourne
2015 ‘Clear Seeing’ Nicholas Projects, Melbourne
2012 ‘Art and Street’ Shoalhaven Regional Gallery. NSW
2012 ‘Lighthouse Exhibition’ Australian Centre Contemporary Art, Melbourne
2010 ‘Space Invaders’ National Gallery of Australia, QUT, RMIT
2010 ‘Blender Group Show’ Michael Koro Galleries, Melbourne
2010 ‘Lighthouse Exhibition’ Australian Centre Contempory Art, Melbourne
2009 ‘Metro Group Show’ Metro Gallery Melbourne
2009 ‘Bullet Proof’ Harrison Galleries, Sydney
2009 ‘Painting’ Melbourne Propaganda Window
2008 ‘Home at Last’ National Gallery of Australia
2008 ‘Resist, Collaborate and Destroy’ Michael Koro Galleries, Melbourne
2008 ‘Urban Monkeys’ Harrison Gallery, Sydney
2008 ‘Splenda’ Michael Koro Galleries, Melbourne
2005 ‘opening Show Exhibition’ Rex Livingston Fine arts, Sydney
2004 ‘Cromwell’s touring Exhibition’ Sydney, Melb. Washington, N.Y
2004 ’67 percent’ Dublin, Melbourne, Budapest.
2004 ‘Permit Zone’ Citylights, Melbourne
2003 ‘Robert Jacks Drawing Prize’ Bendigo Art Gallery, Bendigo
2002 ‘Clear Seeing’ Span Gallery, Melbourne
2001 Seni Art Award McClelland Gallery, Melbourne (winner)
1999 ‘Search’ Monash University Gallery, MUMA. Melbourne
1998 ‘Silent Fall’ Australian emerging artists exhibition’ Linden Gallery, St Kilda
Selected Curating and Project management:
2016 Meeting of Styles Director and curator of Festival, Melbourne
2008 – 2012 Creator and curator of Michael Koro galleries, Melbourne
2012 – present, Director Dark Horse Experiment – research gallery, Melbourne
2001 – present, Director or Blender Studios and Blender Creatives, Melbourne
2009 – 2016 Director of the Melbourne Projection Space, Melbourne
2012 Curated Lighthouse, ACCA, Melbourne
Selected Awards And Scholarships:
2017 PhD Research Training Scholarship, Victoria University
2017 27th Thai International Arts Festival
2012 Australian Postgraduate Award
2004 New work funding, Australia Council
2004 Martin Bequest Traveling Art Scholarship
2004 Australia-China Council Residency, Shanghai, China (April-July)
2003 National College of the Arts Residency, Lahore, Pakistan (April-May)
2002 Pratt family Scholarship, Victorian College of the Arts, Feb – Dec
Many journal publications and articles and in private and public collections both nationally and internationally.
Selected Art Residencies:
2018 13th International Art Residency & Workshop in Poh Chang Academe of Art, Bangkok, Thailand
2018 13th International Art Residency & Workshop, Rajamangala University of Technology Lanna (RMUTL), Chiang Mai, Thailand
2017 12th International Art Residency & Workshop in Poh Chang Academe of Art, Bangkok, Thailand
2017 International Art Residency & Workshop at Rajamangala University of Technology Thanyaburi (RMUTT), Thailand
2004 Australia-China Council Residency, Shanghai, China (April-July)
2003 National College of the Arts Residency, Lahore, Pakistan (April-May)