Looking for a gift for the art lover in your life or simply looking to treat yourself? Our art gift guide has something for everyone - from those just starting their collection to art aficionados.
Liverpool Biennial limited editions present an opportunity to own a work by a leading contemporary artist who has worked with us. The sale of each edition directly supports our new commissions, exhibitions, talks and education programmes.
Liverpool Biennial is part of the Own Art scheme, allowing you to spread the cost of your purchase with an interest-free loan. Please contact info@biennial.com for more information.
Under £50
Liverpool Biennial 25th Anniversary Tea Towel
£14
To commemorate 25 years of bringing ground-breaking contemporary art to the city, we worked with Merseyside-based designers Toucan Tango to design an artwork that celebrates Liverpool Biennial’s legacy of outdoor sculptures delivered across Merseyside.
This 5-colour screen printed tea towel can either be used as a traditional tea towel or framed for display in your home and is certified by the Global Organic Textile Standard, which indicates ecologically and socially responsible supply chain.
Lamin Fofana
Life and Death by Water, 2021
£20
For Liverpool Biennial 2021, Lamin Fofana presented an audio-visual installation at The Lewis’s Building titled ‘Life and Death by Water’ (2021). The project incorporated this special edition 12” vinyl record, ‘Life and Death by Water’, produced in collaboration with SAVVY Contemporary.
First presented as an audio-visual installation, Life and Death by Water takes inspiration from W.E.B. Du Bois’s ‘Darkwater: Voices from Within the Veil’ and M. NourbeSe Philip’s ‘Zong!’. Du Bois’s Darkwater presents an alternate mapping of the interconnected global system of racial capitalism, while Philip’s staggering book-length poem recounts the legal proceedings which took place after the Zong massacre in 1781 – when the captain of the eponymous slave ship ordered 150 enslaved Africans to be murdered by drowning so that the ship’s owners could collect insurance money. The ship was owned by Liverpool merchants, whose crew acted to protect their interests. Through the immersive installation, Fofana uncovered this overlooked history, the horrors of the middle passage and the realities of racial capitalism.
Ryan Gander
Building Blocks for Five Minds of Great Vision, 2018
£35
Deconstruct and rebuild a brutalist icon with this playful special edition by artist Ryan Gander!
Building Blocks for Five Minds of Great Vision is a set of wooden blocks inspired by the Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral, produced alongside Ryan Gander’s major project Time Moves Quickly.
In 2018, Gander worked collaboratively with five children from Knotty Ash Primary School in Liverpool to produce a series of artworks for Liverpool Biennial. The project took inspiration from the Montessori method of education, based on self-directed activity, hands-on learning, and collaborative play.
Under £200
Linder
Bower of Bliss, 2021
£130
This scarf, made from an environmentally sustainable alternative to silk features a detail of Linder’s commission ‘Bower of Bliss’ (2021) from the 11th edition of Liverpool Biennial.
For Liverpool Biennial 2021, Linder was commissioned to produce a street-level billboard Bower of Bliss (2021) within Liverpool ONE. The centuries old phrase “Bower of Bliss” has been used across literature to signify the birthplace and point of origin. For the poet Edmund Spenser, it meant “womb”. For Linder, the connotations link back to her experience of being carried in her mother’s womb in Liverpool in 1954. Her billboard commission presented the “Bower of Bliss” as a safe space, something that is needed now more than ever. The photomontage was made up of images from Liverpool archives and Linder’s own collection.
The scarf is made using a blend of 45% Viscose and 55% Spun Rayon which are both created with sustainable organic substances and act as an environmentally sustainable alternative to traditional silk.
Alicja Biala
Totemy Composition One and Two, 2022
£175 each
These special edition etchings relate to Alicja Biala’s 2022 commission, ‘Merseyside Totemy’, which addresses the urgent issue of the impact of climate change on Merseyside.
Biala’s Totemy Composition etchings showcase the geometric patterns found in the sculptures. Biala chose to create the etching plate using the same metal found on the sculpture and the etching has been created using brass colouring, symbolising the rust effect on the works.
BUY TOTEMY COMPOSITION ONE HERE
BUY TOTEMY COMPOSITION TWO HERE
Under £500
Rudy Loewe
The Reckoning, 2023
£215
This limited-edition silkscreen print by Rudy Loewe was produced as a companion print to their outdoor installation, ‘The Reckoning’, commissioned for Liverpool Biennial 2023, ‘uMoya: The Sacred Return of Lost Things’.
‘The Reckoning’ depicts Moko Jumbie (a stilt walker) and other Carnival mas players (participants who wear masquerade costumes and march in the parade) coming to the aid of the people at a moment of Black Power revolution in Trinidad and Tobago.
Silke Otto-Knapp
A series of images following one from the other Eine aufeinander folgende Reihe von Bildern (Cover), 2018
£300
For Liverpool Biennial 2018, Silke Otto-Knapp was commissioned to produce a new large-scale work for the fourth-floor gallery of Bluecoat. Like a classic frieze, the painting wrapped around the perimeters of the space, combining figures in group formations with abstract panels. This Chromolux print relates directly to the frieze.
Brook Andrew
Pundits Accountable, 2008/2023
£450
This limited-edition Lascaux screenprint by Brook Andrew, entitled ‘Pundits Accountable’ (2008/2023) is a screenprint of an existing collage originally produced in 2008. The original work is composed of black and gold ink and collage of cut out newspaper on canvas.
This new screenprint for Liverpool Biennial serves was produced as a companion piece to ‘NGAAY’ (2023), a large-scale neon work which was produced for Liverpool Biennial 2023, ‘uMoya: The Sacred Return of Lost Things’, and exhibited at Stanley Dock.
Over £500
Yoko Ono
My Mommy Is Beautiful, 1997/2018
£800
‘My Mommy Is Beautiful’, 1997/2018 a limited edition print created by artist Yoko Ono. The work relates to her participation in International 04 and was released to mark Liverpool Biennial’s 20th anniversary in 2018.
The project ‘My Mummy Was Beautiful’ (2004) consisted of the widespread distribution in the city of two images: of a woman’s breast and vagina. The project can be linked thematically with many earlier works by the artist that present an objectified and dislocated view of the body.
Betty Woodman
Fountain, 2016
£950.00
Betty Woodman’s work refers to classical imagery and architectural decoration, combining sources that include Greek and Etruscan sculpture, Minoan and Egyptian art, Italian Baroque architecture and the paintings of Bonnard, Picasso and Matisse
This limited-edition digital pigment print refers to Woodman’s large-scale outdoor work ‘Liverpool Fountain’, commissioned for Liverpool Biennial 2016.
To explore our full range of limited editions and merchandise, visit biennial.com/shop.