Harley Manifold Art for Sale and Sold Prices

b. 1982 -

Harley Manifold was born in Camperdown, Victoria in 1982. In 2003 he completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts at Deakin University in Warrnambool. He then went onto complete his Honours in Fine Arts at the Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne as the only non – previous student in his year. He has been included in numerous Art prizes and group exhibitions. On three occasions he has been a finalist in Australia’s richest art prize for emerging artists, The Metro Art Award, and consecutively for the previous two prizes. Also two time finalist in the Doug Moran National Portrait Prize (2015 & 2017) as well as the Salon Des Refuses of the Archibald Prize (2016).

Manifold’s oil paintings depict the lone figure ambling through life – in alleyways in Melbourne landscapes, dwarfed by skyscrapers and highway overpasses, quiet places like bathrooms, and the countryside to which he has returned. A dark, saturated palette details hard geometrical surroundings, bathed in the soft liminal glow of dusk and the night-time sky. Sometimes adorning the figure’s torso, a flimsy upturned cardboard box, mimics yet contrasts the impenetrable vast, heavy buildings – yet provides camouflage and protection and paradoxically severing the connection with the outside. This recurring motif’s vulnerable transient interior is accentuated by the sturdy veneers of the surrounding concreted architecture and questions the influence of the modern social delineations, boundaries and interfaces we traverse daily. Manifold’s paintings tread the discourse of unnoticed physical and psychological terrains. City landscapes, constructed by people yet cluttered by ‘anti-spaces’, Manifold’s paintings reflect tensions between states of camouflage and discontinuity in an era of increased communication and alienation. These intimate self-portraits open enquiries regarding the place and positioning of the human condition in this contemporary technological age.

His works are in numerous private collections in Australia, as well as France and America. And has held numerous solo shows in Melbourne, including shows in Perth and Adelaide.

Harley Manifold lives and paints full time in Jan Juc extending his practice to include portraits and copies of masters by commission.