Wayne Burrows
Studio A7
Wayne Burrows currently works with writing, cut and paste collage, popular music, found film footage and archival photography, often exploring the overlaps between historical fact, fiction and myth in work that deliberately blurs the distinctions between past and present, received truth and folklore, art and kitsch, authenticity and forgery. Much of his visual arts work since 2010 has been credited to pseudonyms (notably Robert Holcombe, b.1923 – d.2003), framed as fiction and – since 2018 – made in collaboration with artists working against, or wholly or partly outside, the increasingly academic and micro-managed professionalized arts system.
Alongside visual arts work he has published poetry, short fiction, journalism and essays, delivered a wide variety of talks – from Further Adventures in Class & Contemporary Art (CAMP) to Decoding Monkey and Filmoteka (Nottingham Contemporary) – while working with organisations like Nottinghamshire Hospice, The Literary Consultancy, Place, Hatch and Backlit. Recent publications include Eastern Bloc Songs: Party, Pop & Politics (Centrala, 2018), Exotica Suite & Other Fictions (Shoestring, 2015), Black Glass: New & Selected Poems (Shoestring, 2015), The Holcombe Tarot (Limited Edition, 2014), Marine: A Story in Eight Objects (Nottingham Castle, 2013), and The Apple Sequence (Orchard Editions, 2011).
![Wayne Burrows: Folklore Series - Forest Bathing (c1979) [Robert Holcombe]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/58122fd8ff7c50ab8fe9a0cf/1653642383034-WMAHZ3SD6NLX12UONKMW/Folklore+Series+-+Forest+Bathing+%28c1979%29+%5BRobert+Holcombe%5D.jpg)
![Wayne Burrows: Folklore Series - The Animals' Revolutionary Council Proclaims the First London Cross-Species Socialist International To Humanity During the 1926 General Strike (1976) [Robert Holcombe]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/58122fd8ff7c50ab8fe9a0cf/1653642387545-F5M5LFVY0SAVTSFJX8V2/Folklore+Series+-+The+Animals%27+Revolutionary+Council+Proclaims+the+First+London+Cross-Species+Socialist+International+To+Humanity+During+the+1926+General+Strike+%281976%29+%5BRobert+Holcombe%5D.JPG)
![Wayne Burrows: Folklore Series - The Crowning of the May Queen (1978) [Robert Holcombe]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/58122fd8ff7c50ab8fe9a0cf/1653642391915-3U5TTPIBERZZXEO5G4HC/Folklore+Series+-+The+Crowning+of+the+May+Queen+%281978%29+%5BRobert+Holcombe%5D.JPG)
![Wayne Burrows: Folklore Series - The Meadow (1977) [Robert Holcombe] [photo by Luke Brennan]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/58122fd8ff7c50ab8fe9a0cf/1653642396139-U3YKFYXOUUDB2275CN7M/Folklore+Series+-+The+Meadow+%281977%29+%5BRobert+Holcombe%5D+%5Bphoto+by+Luke+Brennan%5D.jpg)
![Wayne Burrows: Immersion III (Milk Capital - Riot) [1970] [Robert Holcombe]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/58122fd8ff7c50ab8fe9a0cf/1653642400764-LS9EVSBXDIITYHTYNLX2/Immersion+III+%28Milk+Capital+-+Riot%29+%5B1970%5D+%5BRobert+Holcombe%5D.JPG)
![Wayne Burrows: Immersion VII (Le Festin) [1971] [Robert Holcombe]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/58122fd8ff7c50ab8fe9a0cf/1653642409750-TJD2EJTXS3I3DZ2QHGE5/Immersion+VII+%28Le+Festin%29+%5B1971%5D+%5BRobert+Holcombe%5D.JPG)
![Wayne Burrows: Lakeland Study - Grasmoor and Buttermere from Scarth Gap (undated) [Robert Holcombe]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/58122fd8ff7c50ab8fe9a0cf/1653642412992-SB4TGY6CM1DBI8DDEO4O/Lakeland+Study+-+Grasmoor+and+Buttermere+from+Scarth+Gap+%28undated%29+%5BRobert+Holcombe%5D.jpg)
![Wayne Burrows: Telekinesis Series - The Golden Dawn (1957) [Robert Holcombe] [photo by Luke Brennan]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/58122fd8ff7c50ab8fe9a0cf/1653642421599-FP4U5N5M26SUKA34MM8J/Telekinesis+Series+-+The+Golden+Dawn+%281957%29+%5BRobert+Holcombe%5D+%5Bphoto+by+Luke+Brennan%5D.jpg)
![Folklore Series - Wayne Burrows: Forest Portal (1978) [Robert Holcombe]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/58122fd8ff7c50ab8fe9a0cf/1653644157448-MV512314WR4EHWPTS77N/Folklore+Series+-+Forest+Portal+%281978%29+%5BRobert+Holcombe%5D.jpg)
Exhibitions and commissions include: Ubu Film: Part 4 Altered State/Spiral (for Renaysonce Fayre, RCA/Everything Forever, 2021), Works From The Hallucinated Archive (Bonington Gallery, 2019), The Buried Moon: Heart of A Cave (with Strange Names Collective for Lakes Ignite 2018), Eastern Bloc Songs: Party, Pop & Politics/Unmaking History (Centrala, 2018), Telekinesis: Ghost Pornography & Fabricated Phenomena (Watch-It, 2017), Behold! The Markets Shall Erase Our History! (Nottingham Contemporary, 2016), Exotica Suite (with Paul Isherwood, New Art Exchange, 2015), Folklore, Ritual & The Modern Interior (Xero Kline & Coma, 2014), The Family Bible & Other Fables/Desire Machines & New Worlds (Syson, 2013) and Disturbances (with The Advisory Circle, Annexinema, 2010).