David Buckingham

Los Angeles · found metal and salvaged steel
Studio
Los Angeles
Medium
found metal and salvaged steel

“Beautiful, battered metal, material that’s had a previous life and the scars to prove it.” -David Buckingham

David Buckingham (b. 1958, Los Angeles, CA) makes sculpture from what the American landscape has already discarded. Working out of a DTLA studio, he scours the windblown deserts and industrial margins of Southern California for barrels, road signs, tractor parts, and car doors, welding and muscling found metal into work that turns the culture’s own language back on itself. All color is original as found. Buckingham does not paint.

Trained as an advertising creative director, he spent two decades writing copy across New York, Boston, San Francisco, and Sydney before a chance encounter with Ray “Cowboy” Kelly and the Rivington School, a band of anarchist welders operating out of an abandoned East Village lot, changed the trajectory entirely. He has presented over twenty solo exhibitions across the US and internationally, including shows at O.K. Harris, New York; Packer/Schopf Gallery, Chicago; and Scream, London. His work is held in private collections worldwide.

Studio Film

Artist Statement

Got a show in New Orleans. Went to work. Thought about stuff. Started kicking metal around. Thinking. Scheming. Plotting. Remembered seeing Dave Turgeon and The Sluts in the 80s. Led to distant memory of nights at CBGB. Heard a Zappa song on the radio, then a kinky story from a vanilla friend. Someone asked where’d you go to school? Told that someone to shut up. Laughed when recalling The World According to Ray Kelly.

Muttered meh under breath. Then I got busy. With sparks. Noise. Blood. Fire. Now I’m done. Enjoy.

Language shapes identity, I spent twenty years in advertising learning exactly how. My sculptures do the same thing in steel. Words get twisted, symbols get recontextualized, meaning shifts. The metal I use has already lived a life; I just give it a second argument. Each series is self-excavation. Three things are allowed in the studio: Punk Rock, Pot, and Welding.

No works selected for this artist.

EXHIBITION HISTORY
SCROLL
2026
GROUP
The Shape of Things
Lion And Lamb, Philadelphia, USA
GROUP
Crossroads
Van Der Plas Gallery, New York, NY
2024
GROUP
25th Anniversary Show
Bert Green Fine Art, Los Angeles, CA
2023
GROUP
Summer in SOMA
Andrea Schwartz Gallery, San Francisco, CA
2019
SOLO
Nobody Likes a Smartass
Caldwell Snyder Gallery, San Francisco, CA
GROUP
Holiday Gift Guide
Artist's Proof, Los Angeles, CA
2018
SOLO
If I Only Had a Brain
Caldwell Snyder, San Francisco, CA
2017
SOLO
Hard Drugs Made Me a Better Person
Artist's Proof, Los Angeles, CA
GROUP
Pink Pop-Up
Castelli Art Space, Los Angeles, CA
2016
SOLO
Punk Rock, Pot, and Welding
Artist's Proof, Los Angeles, CA
SOLO
What a Long Strange Trip It’s Been
Caldwell Snyder, CA
2015
SOLO
Strong Medicine
Jonathan Ferrara Gallery, New Orleans, LA

Residencies & Public Projects

Publications & Press

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