rhiancooke@gmail.com
IG: @rhiancooke
Rhian Cooke is an artist based in Leeds, making work across film, animation, sculpture and installation. Her work presents surreal urban worlds, moving between scales, textures and the real and imagined. She explores and transforms everyday objects and environments, embodying inner landscapes through movement, repetition and transformation. Drawing on imagery captured with her personal mobile phone camera, alongside drawn animation and light, her work reveals connections between inner experience, technology and the physical world.
She often uses vehicles and protective transport equipment as source material, including recovery vehicles, the Toyota Prius and bike helmets. She creates sculptural forms across film and installation using handmade processes and collected recycled materials, such as silver foil packaging, hair clips and electrical wire. She takes a three-dimensional and inventive approach to filmmaking, emphasising movement and physical space. Her works often loop, with no clear beginning or end, creating connections that feel just out of reach.
Selected Exhibitions
2023 Leeds Artist Show, Leeds Art Gallery, Leeds
2022 Open Exhibition, Ferens Art Gallery, Hull
2019 Divide by Two (Solo), BLANK_Gallery, Index Festival, University Centre Leeds
2019 Associated Matter, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Wakefield
2017 Common Points, Serf, Leeds
Selected Screenings
2020 Re-shift, Re-calibrate, Pavilion, Hyde Park Picture House, Leeds
2019 An Eye To Notice Them, Hyde Park Picture House, Leeds
2019 Theme From "The Gentle Touch", Pavilion, Hyde Park Picture House, Leeds
2018 The Video Art Film Club, Leyden Gallery, London
2018 Leeds Digital Art Festival, Millennium Square, Leeds
2018 Playback Festival, Institute of Contemporary Arts, London
Selected Commissions
2025 Wow Now, Light Night Leeds, Yorkshire Contemporary
2024 Invisible Real, collaboration with Faye MacCalman, The Glasshouse, Newcastle
2022 Loose Screw Film Festival Commission, The Art House, Wakefield
2022 Invisible Real, collaboration with Faye MacCalman, Cheltenham Jazz Festival
2021 Material Matters, Sunny Bank Mills
2019-20 Bicentenary of Anne Brontë Engagement Project, South Square Gallery
2018 Random Acts North Commission, Tyneside Cinema, Home Machester & True North
Awards & Residencies
2025 Practice Leeds, Yorkshire Contemporary
2019 Yorkshire Sculpture International Associate Artist
2017 The Art House Graduate Residency
2017 Serf Graduate Residency
Selected Press
2026 ‘Shaped Around Us’ – Practice: Leeds, Yorkshire Contemporary’s Artist Development Programme, Corridor 8
2019 Yorkshire Sculpture International Associate Artist, The Yorkshire Post
2019 Divide by Two, Blank_ Gallery, Corridor 8
Full cv available on request
SeIG: @rhiancooke
Rhian Cooke is an artist based in Leeds, making work across film, animation, sculpture and installation. Her work presents surreal urban worlds, moving between scales, textures and the real and imagined. She explores and transforms everyday objects and environments, embodying inner landscapes through movement, repetition and transformation. Drawing on imagery captured with her personal mobile phone camera, alongside drawn animation and light, her work reveals connections between inner experience, technology and the physical world.
She often uses vehicles and protective transport equipment as source material, including recovery vehicles, the Toyota Prius and bike helmets. She creates sculptural forms across film and installation using handmade processes and collected recycled materials, such as silver foil packaging, hair clips and electrical wire. She takes a three-dimensional and inventive approach to filmmaking, emphasising movement and physical space. Her works often loop, with no clear beginning or end, creating connections that feel just out of reach.
Selected Exhibitions
2023 Leeds Artist Show, Leeds Art Gallery, Leeds
2022 Open Exhibition, Ferens Art Gallery, Hull
2019 Divide by Two (Solo), BLANK_Gallery, Index Festival, University Centre Leeds
2019 Associated Matter, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Wakefield
2017 Common Points, Serf, Leeds
Selected Screenings
2020 Re-shift, Re-calibrate, Pavilion, Hyde Park Picture House, Leeds
2019 An Eye To Notice Them, Hyde Park Picture House, Leeds
2019 Theme From "The Gentle Touch", Pavilion, Hyde Park Picture House, Leeds
2018 The Video Art Film Club, Leyden Gallery, London
2018 Leeds Digital Art Festival, Millennium Square, Leeds
2018 Playback Festival, Institute of Contemporary Arts, London
Selected Commissions
2025 Wow Now, Light Night Leeds, Yorkshire Contemporary
2024 Invisible Real, collaboration with Faye MacCalman, The Glasshouse, Newcastle
2022 Loose Screw Film Festival Commission, The Art House, Wakefield
2022 Invisible Real, collaboration with Faye MacCalman, Cheltenham Jazz Festival
2021 Material Matters, Sunny Bank Mills
2019-20 Bicentenary of Anne Brontë Engagement Project, South Square Gallery
2018 Random Acts North Commission, Tyneside Cinema, Home Machester & True North
Awards & Residencies
2025 Practice Leeds, Yorkshire Contemporary
2019 Yorkshire Sculpture International Associate Artist
2017 The Art House Graduate Residency
2017 Serf Graduate Residency
Selected Press
2026 ‘Shaped Around Us’ – Practice: Leeds, Yorkshire Contemporary’s Artist Development Programme, Corridor 8
2019 Yorkshire Sculpture International Associate Artist, The Yorkshire Post
2019 Divide by Two, Blank_ Gallery, Corridor 8
Full cv available on request