LONDON.- Today Hayward Gallery opened the first and most comprehensive survey of work by internationally-acclaimed artist Martin Creed. This major exhibition, which spans the entire gallery, including its outside terraces, unveils a series of exciting new commissions, and brings together the full range of Creed’s work. Featuring over 160 works, it includes Creed’s most discreet moments – a spot of blu-tack – as well as his eccentric and extravagant room-sized installations, neons, sequential sculptures, kinetic installations, films, and vibrant paintings.

Martin Creed (b.1968) is best known for his Turner-prize winning installation Work No. 127 The Lights Going On and Off (1995), which is included in the exhibition and disrupts the viewer’s experience of the gallery space. Applying the systematic qualities that are so often present in his works, for this Hayward Gallery retrospective, Creed has created a monumental new piece – Work no. 1812 (2014) – a colourful wall of bricks and mortar, made of 80 different types of bricks that overlooks Waterloo bridge.

As visitors enter the exhibition, they are confronted by a room-filling, rotating neon and steel structure spelling out MOTHERS. Also in the first room is Work No. 112 (1995-2004), 39 metronomes simultaneously tick at different speeds creating a cacophony of sight and sound that continues throughout the exhibition. Another highlight of the exhibition is Work No. 200 (1998), a room half-filled with white balloons which creates a joyous and chaotic social experience as visitors negotiate the space. This work is contained by another brand-new piece Work No. 1804 (2014), a wall made of steel and 39 differently coloured and textured varieties of glass.

Giant paintings fill entire walls throughout the exhibition and several series of everyday objects are collected into sequences. The exhibition also brings together a number of Creed’s early minimalist works, and sets them alongside Work No. 736 Piano Accompaniment (2007), a live piano performance, played continually throughout the day. Creed’s candid and austere films exploring the limits of the human body are also featured. For the first time in the UK, the pivotal Work No. 1000 (2009-2010) is exhibited, a monumental colour series comprised of 1000 prints made with broccoli, as well as Work No. 1686 (2013), a car that opens up and turns on and closes down and switches off.

Cliff Lauson, Hayward Gallery Curator, said: “Martin Creed has been recognised around the world for his art that is both playful and thought-provoking. Crossing all artistic media and including musical and performative elements, his works transform common materials and actions into surprising meditations on existence, choice, and the invisible structures that shape our everyday experiences. We are very excited to be the first gallery to take a comprehensive look at the past 30 years of his work.”

Martin Creed said: "What's the point of it?”

Martin Creed was born in 1968 in Wakefield, England and was brought up in Glasgow, Scotland. He studied art at the Slade School of Art, London from 1986-1990. Creed is one of the United Kingdom’s leading artists and winner of the 2001 Turner Prize. His work has been exhibited internationally and is collected by venues including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Moscow Museum of Modern Art; the Centre Pompidou–Metz, France; Tate Modern, London; Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, Netherlands; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. Recently, Creed’s Work No. 1197: All the bells in a country rung as quickly and as loudly as possible for three minutes opened the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic celebrations as part of the London 2012 Festival. Creed lives and works in London and Alicudi, Italy.