"Statement Artist" Ray Laing Remains Saatchi Online Top 50 Favourite

PR Log (Press Release) – Nov 08, 2009 – Undoubtedly Ray Laing has become one of, if not the most, controversial artist listed with Saatchi Gallery Online, an innovative art platform launched by advertising magnate Charles Saatchi in 2006. For the last 18 months Ray Laing has contributed to the Saatchi Showdown art competition and achieved Top 50 Favorites positions as voted by the international art public. However, this success has not been without incident. Every succeeding round of Showdown has generated new artworks in protest to Ray Laing’s blood-red statements printed on pristine canvas. With a talent for scoring pointed one-liners, the ever-self-quotable Ray Laing appears to be simultaneously enlarging the boundaries of artistic aesthetics and tenable public speech.

“I have been an artist for many years. I was involved with traditional painting, then digital art and finally came up with the concept of “Statement Art”. Like art that cuts through the chase. People would ask what your art is trying to say. In Statement Art what you get is explicitly what you read, you know. I didn‘t think that the Internet would generate any significant sales, but there've been interested collectors from many different parts of the world where I didn‘t even realize they spoke English.”