Visual artist, curator, lecturer, arts consultant, for over 40 years has occupied a central position in the research, origination and advocacy of contemporary international art textiles. He has exhibited in major galleries and museums world wide, including the Victoria and Albert Museum, the National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra and the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa.
His work can be seen in private, public and corporate collections worldwide. He won The Creative Concept Award in 1987 and The Fine Art Award in 1989 at the International Textile Competition in Kyoto, followed by the first RSA Art for Architecture Award 1990. In 1990 he was awarded a Distinguished Visiting Fellowship, British Council, City University, Kyoto, Japan. In 1992 he was 1st Prize Winner at the 3rd International Betonac Prize in Belgium.
From 2001-08 he was awarded an Arts and Humanities Research Board (AHRB) Fellowship in the Creative and Performing Arts in conjunction with the University of Ulster to research geometrical complexity in Central Asian textiles at Ulster University, Belfast. In 2007 he won the Fine Art Award, Phaff Art Embroidery, Still Life in France. In 2013 he was awarded a residency in Australia through Craft ACT to work at the Namadgi National Park, Canberra.
In 1982 he curated the controversial exhibition Fabric and Form for the British Council & Crafts Council and was a selector the Makers Eye for the Crafts Council, followed in 1992 with Restless Shadows a major Goldsmiths College touring exhibition of contemporary Japanese Textiles. Until 1989 he was a senior lecturer in the department of visual art at Goldsmiths College, University of London. He has taught extensively in Colleges and Universities in the UK and overseas, and has undertaken residencies in Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and Belgium. He was Visiting Professor of Ornament at the University of Wolverhampton 2013-17.
Forever Changes a major retrospective of Michael Brennand-Wood’s practice was first shown at Ruthin Crafts Centre in 2012. Commissions include the development of an interdisciplinary arts programme for music venues, Ocean, in East London 1999 and Bristol Beacon, in Bristol, 2009. Queen’s University, Library, Belfast 2010 and a series of metal screens Microscape 2017 for the Clinical Research Centre at Addenbrooke’s Hospital and Pictographic, 2019 River Lane both in Cambridge.
