Born 1960 in Hertfordshire, England
Artist Statement
I have been a figurative artist all my adult life, but in the last seven years I have begun to make work with no specific reference other than its need to be drawn. The more complex the drawing, the more involved I get and the drawing itself guides and tells me something, whether it’s an abstract mental concentration, a passage into nature, or fractal forms that split, grow, contort and make their own journey on the page. Endless spirals challenge my concentration and require feverish intensity; geometric shapes find a way of imitating nature and grow into scales, feathers, plants, sounds waves and circles. I like to draw from the inside to the outside. I'm interested in putting shapes on a page that give breath to what it is to be alive, human and subject to all the complexities of the universe. I think of the drawings as maps to reason, mindfulness and the beauty of life on Earth.
Education
1984 Royal College of Art, M.A.
1981 Maidstone College of Art, B.A.
One Man Exhibitions
2000 “Feed Me”, Nigel Coates Gallery, London
2000 “Man and Nature”, Galerie Timothy Tew, Atlanta
1998 “Numinous”, Galerie Timothy Tew
1997 The Atrium, London
1997 Galerie Timothy Tew
1995 Galerie Timothy Tew
1993 Galerie Timothy Tew
1992 Galerie Timothy Tew
1988 Carlile Gallery, London
1986 Carlile Gallery, London
1984 Canterbury Arts Festival, Canterbury, England
Group Shows
2021 Tew GAlleries, Salon Style, Atlanta, GA
2017 TEW Galleries Salon Show, Atlanta, GA
2016 TEW Galleries; Portraits & Still Life with Haidee Becker & Isabelle Melchior
2007 TEW, 20th Anniversary Exhibition, TEW Galleries, Atlanta, GA
2005 Stephanus Heidacker, Stewart Helm & Eric Ansel
2004 "Under Different Circumstances" Atlanta Contemporary Art Center
2004 Stewart Helm, Kimo Minton, Chris Bilton, Galerie Timothy Tew, Atlanta, GA
2002 "The British are Coming!" Stewart Helm, Haidee Becker, and Adrian Ryan, Galerie Timothy Tew, Atlanta GA
2000 Drawing, Jibby Bean, London
1999 Group Show, Galerie Timothy Tew, Atlanta, Georgia
1999 Exquisite Corpse, Jibby Bean, London
1998 The Look of Love, John Hansard Gallery, Southhampton
1997 The Look of Love, (Rear Window), The Approach, London
1997 Busy Blood, Jibby Bean, London
1997 Grammercy International Art Fair, Jibby Bean, New York
1996 Stewart Helm, Edith Caywood, and Adrian Ryan, Galerie Timothy Tew
1995 Stewart Helm, Alice Maher, Ann Messner, Ingrid Stahl, Todd Gallery, London
1994 Art Miami, Miami - Galerie Timothy Tew
1993 Water Colour, Curwen Gallery, London
1993 Projet Unité, Le Corbusier's Unite d'Habitation, Firminy, France
1992 Object Studies, Galerie Timothy Tew
1991 Sacred - Lucy Currie, Stewart Helm and Kimo Minton, Galerie Timothy Tew
1991 The Discerning Eye, Mall Galleries, London
1990 A walk on the Wild Side, Pomeroy Purdy Gallery, London
1988 Print Show, Carlile Gallery, London
1987 Holy Matter, Carlile Gallery
1987 Drawings, Carlile Gallery
1986 Small Works, Carlile Gallery
1986 Opening Show, Carlile Gallery
1985 Two-Person Show for South East Arts, Epsom, Surrey
1995 Whitechapel Open, London
1984 Christies Inaugural (Pick of New Graduates)
1984 British Print Biennale, Bradford, England
1984 Folio Society Award, London
1983 Whitworth Contemporaries, Manchester
1983 New Contemporaries, ICA, London
1983 Consort Gallery, London
1982 British Drawing at the Hayward Annual, London
1981 Ferens Art Gallery, Hull, England
Awards
1984 Folio Society Award, London
Commissions
1992 Dining room mural for private apartment, Palais Royal, Paris. Featured in House and Garden, British Edition and Vogue, French Edition
Mural Voyages Imaginaires for the Welcome Building, London. Series of 8 panel paintings
1991 Triwandaborad mural for the Jigsaw Retail Group, St. Christopher's Place, London
Large mural for the Jigsaw Retail Group, Knightsbridge, London
1990 Taxim - Cycle of wall paintings for Taxim Club Complex, Istanbul, Turkey
1989 Cycle of paintings for Hotel Maritime, Otaru, Japan. Architect for the project, Nigel Coates
1988 Paintings for the L'Arc de Noe restaurant in Sappora, Japan. Architect for the project, Nigel Coates
Publications
Works united in having wonderfully disparate voices, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Sunday, January 25, 2004, page M3, Catherine Fox.
Loop Volume # 2. Stewart Helm, Group Show, pages 34-37. November, 1999.
Inhabitants of Helms's Eden suggest female/male synthesis, Atlanta Journal and Constitution, Sunday, December 12, 1993, page N2, Catherine Fox.
More Tension, Creative Loafing, December 11, 1993, page 33, Amy Jinkner-Lloyd.
Critics' Choices, Group Show, Atlanta Journal and Constitution, Saturday, August 3, 1993, page 32, Catherine Fox.
Sacred, The Atlanta Journal and Constitution, Friday, July 26, 1991, page E2, Catherine Fox.