About "Crowned (elements)"

"Crowned(elements)"  is a work by Tony Mcateer, a photographer from Belfast now living in Bath, UK. 

An architecture of ever more elaborate facades and tech-enabled structure is keenly worn like jewellery by our cities. 

In these photographs an intense play with colour, form and surface tease out the delirium, complexity and beauty of the high impact urban era that we're living through.

The photographs look at what architecture can be in its boldest sense – large cultural constructs of economy, politics, imagination and myth. It represents the large systems that act on us and is therefore a constant fascination to him, a constant puzzle to grapple with and try to get a hold on.

Having photographed in the regions at the forefront of urban growth over many years, he has seen cities scrambling for attention-grabbing architecture to put themselves on the map. Once limited to a few leading world cities, spectacle architecture has jumped and accelerated all around the world.

Crowned is a large, ongoing project that follows this development from the long-time global cities of New York and London, through to the new skylines of the Middle East and the re-modelled cities of China.

Dubai skyline with Burj Khalifa

Dubai skyline with Burj Khalifa

Red Cube & Brown Brothers, 140 Broadway. NY

Red Cube & Brown Brothers, 140 Broadway. NY

1 First St, Manchester

1 First St, Manchester

Looking down 7th Ave. from 54th st. NY

Looking down 7th Ave. from 54th st. NY

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Westbay Skyline, Doha

Westbay Skyline, Doha

Looking north up William St. from Pine St. NY

Looking north up William St. from Pine St. NY

Hudson Yards and skyline, NY

Hudson Yards and skyline, NY

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The Oculus,1 WTC and 7 WTC. NY

The Oculus,1 WTC and 7 WTC. NY

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10th Ave, looking east along West 18th st. NY

10th Ave, looking east along West 18th st. NY

Deansgate Sq, Manchester

Deansgate Sq, Manchester

The Shard, London

The Shard, London

About Tony Mcateer

Tony Mcateer is a photographer from Belfast now living in Bath, UK. Since finishing his MA in Fine Art & Visual Culture in 2000, he has been using photography to probe at the social narratives inherent in the structures and transformations of urban growth around the world.

In the sweeping views of City+, the intense attention to structure, detail and surface of Crowned, through to a particular look at two Chinese city centres in Flat-Pack, his work illustrates a continual fascination with urbanism as the boldest expression of social structures acting on us.

He has received several photography awards including Architectural Photographer of the Year at the ND awards in 2016. And most recently been a winner of PDN's Curator, Fine Art Photography award, 2019. His work has also been included in several international exhibitions, most recently ‘Look’ Photo Biennial Liverpool in Oct 2019, the PDN award exhibition, Canoe Studios, NY Oct 2019 and the LA Month of Photography in May 2018. 

URL: www.tonymcateer.co.uk

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tonymcateer1/