Current

Exeter Contemporary Open, Exeter Phoenix, 12 Sept – 1 Nov 2025
The Art of Resilience, Manchester Art Gallery, 2025-26 (Workshop Programme)

Upcoming

ARTiculate (Visiting Artist Talk), University of Derby, Nov 2025
Salford 100: Workshop Series & Banner Commission, Art With Heart, Salford, Nov 2025 – Jan 2026, with Emily Simpson
Solo exhibition, Warrington Museum & Art Gallery, Feb - Apr 2026, with Emily Simpson (More information TBA)
Solo exhibition, Phoenix Art Space, Brighton, Mar - Apr 2026 (More information TBA)

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Education

Syllabus III, Wysing Arts Centre, Eastside Projects, Iniva, New Contemporaries, S1 Artspace, Spike Island and Studio Voltaire, 2017-18
BA (Hons) Fine Art, Middlesex University, 2011-14

Solo/Duo Exhibitions

Hold Space for the Unfixable, The Birley, Preston, July - Aug 2025, with Emily Simpson
Grief Must Be Love with Nowhere to Go, Bloc Projects, Sheffield, Mar - May 2024, with Emily Simpson
Tied to Everything Else, Paradise Works, Salford, April - May 2023, curated by Will Marshall
Englishness is a Moving Target, Studio KIND., Braunton, Aug – Sept 2021
Throughout the Fragment of Infinity That We Have Come to Know, The NewBridge Project, Gateshead, Mar – Sept 2020
The Ballad of The White Ship, Serf, Leeds, July 2018, in collaboration with Liam Geary Baulch
the man who moved too far, too fast, Lewisham Arthouse, London, May 2016
Under the Shade I Flourish, xero, kline & coma, London, Mar - Apr 2016
Video Des Monats, Hartware MedienKunstVerein (HMKV), Dortmund, DE, Mar 2016
Outdancing Formations, Edith-Russ-Haus, Oldenburg, DE, Sept – Oct 2015, alongside Marta Popivoda

Group Exhibitions

Exeter Contemporary Open, Exeter Phoenix, Sept – Nov 2025
Unbearable Lightness of Being, Paradise Works, Salford, Sept - Oct 2024, with Emily Simpson
Ventriloquism, The Whitaker Museum & Art Gallery, Rossendale, Aug - Nov 2024
The John Ruskin Prize: Seeing the Unseen, Hearing the Unspoken, Trinity Buoy Wharf, London, Feb 2024
Displace, Bloc Projects, Sheffield, Sept 2021, selected by Uthra Rajgopal
Imagens Resolutivas, FIF_BH: Festival Internacional de Fotografia, Palacio das Artes, Belo Horizonte, BR, July - Sept 2021
Plymouth Contemporary, KARST, Plymouth, July – Sept 2021
Reclaim Cultural Surplus, OnCurating Project Space, Zurich, CH, May 2021
Common or Garden, Catalyst Arts, Belfast, Dec 2020 – Jan 2021
25 of 78, Hartware MedienKunstVerein (HMKV), Dortmund, DE, June – Sept 2020
Parade, Broadway Gallery, Letchworth Garden City, Dec 2019 – Feb 2020, curated by Kris Day
Artists & Their Pets, TOMA Project Space, Southend-On-Sea, Dec 2019 – Feb 2020
Millennialism, Paradise Works, Manchester, Oct 2019, curated by Emily Simpson & Will Marshall
For Solidarity, The NewBridge Project, Gateshead, Sept – Nov 2019
Survey, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, July - Sept 2019
24th Gabrovo Biennial of Humour and Satire in Art: Dimensions of Publicness, Museum of Humour and Satire, Gabrovo, BG, May - Sept 2019
Survey, Bluecoat, Liverpool, Apr - June 2019
Survey, g39, Cardiff, Feb - Mar 2019
i miss u said the lol cats, oh kay gall, York, Jan - Feb 2019
Bloomberg New Contemporaries, South London Gallery, Dec 2018 - Feb 2019
Survey, Jerwood Space, London, Oct - Dec 2018, nominated by Andy Holden
Can We Still Be Friends, Guest Projects, London, Aug 2018
Bloomberg New Contemporaries, Liverpool John Moores University (Liverpool Biennial), July - Sept 2018
MEANWHILE, LOWER.GREEN, Norwich, July 2018
Three Models for Change, Stryx, Birmingham, June 2018
EBC019, East Bristol Contemporary, Bristol, May 2018
more of an avalanche, Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge, Feb - Apr 2018, as part of Syllabus III
Members' Show 2017, OUTPOST, Norwich, Nov - Dec 2017, selected by Andy Holden
You're Surrounded by Me, Turf Projects, Croydon, July - Sept 2017 (Artist & Curator)
UK Young Artists National Festival, QUAD, Derby, Nov 2016 (Screening)
Of the Sea, The Historic Dockyard, Chatham, May - July 2016
"it was quick, but fun", Lewisham Arthouse, London, May - June 2016, selected by Jeremy Deller
Loading Mercury with a Pitchfork, Nice Gallery, London, June 2015 (Artist & Curator)
Collyer Bristow Graduate Award and Exhibition 2014, Collyer Bristow Gallery, London, Oct 2014 - Jan 2015
Exuberant Politics, Public Space One, Iowa City, USA, Mar - Apr 2014

Commissions

Tending to My Grief (Workshop Series), At The Library, Liverpool, 2025, in collaboration with Emily Simpson
Banner Commission: Pendle Festival of Culture, Building Bridges, 2025
Window Text, Centre for Contemporary Art, Derry-Londonderry, 2024
Ways to Speak Absence, Manchester Independents, Manchester, 2023
Bloc Billboard, Bloc Projects, Sheffield, 2023, in collaboration with Emily Simpson
Banner Commission: Festival of Culture Peace Walk, In-Situ & Building Bridges, 2022
A Modest Show, Manchester, 2022, in collaboration with Emily Simpson
PRIMEdesign Commission, KARST & Take A Part, Plymouth, 2022
Interruptions: Dark Times Karaoke Club, Holden Gallery, Manchester, 2021-22
Northern Voices, Manchester Collective, 2021
Banner Commission: Aspex at 40, Aspex, Portsmouth, 2021
Centenary Commission, The Penn Club, London, 2019-20
The Billboard Commission, Spit & Sawdust, Cardiff, 2018
Adam Speaks, The National Trust, Croome, 2017, mentored by Hew Locke
Keeley Round, Turf Projects, Croydon, 2016

Awards, Grants & Bursaries

Exeter Contemporary Award Winner 2025 (jointly awarded to Chris Alton, Andy Cluer, and Yiduo Cheng)
The 6th John Ruskin Prize, 2024 (Shortlisted)
Arts Council National Lottery Project Grant, 2023
a-n Artist Bursary 2022
Jerwood Bursary 2020
a-n Artist Bursary 2020
The Next Thing Award 2017, Bury Art Museum & Sculpture Centre (Shortlisted)
Fenton Arts Trust Bursary 2017
Light Eye Mind Graduate Award 2016
Edith-Russ-Haus Award for Emerging Media Artists of the Sparda Bank 2015
Lewisham Arthouse Graduate Studio Award 2015
Collyer Bristow Graduate Award 2014, selected by Emma Dexter

Residencies & Programmes

Work/Leisure_4, Abingdon Studios, Blackpool, Aug - Oct 2024, with Emily Simpson
PROFORMA x Begehungen Residency, Longsight Art Space, Manchester, July – Aug 2022
HOME Artist Film Lab, HOME, Manchester, Feb 2022
SUSTAIN: Artist Digital Exchange, Castlefield Gallery, Manchester & Aarhus Billedkunstcenter, DK, Oct 2021 – Mar 2022
The Faculty North, Heart of Glass, 2021
Making of Us, The Turnpike, Leigh, 2020-21
Link & Shift Residency, Eastside Projects, Nov 2018 - July 2019
Interdisciplinary Residency, Hospitalfield, Arbroath, Nov 2018
Liebermann Villa Emerging Artists Programme, British Council: UK/Germany 2018, Berlin, DE, Oct 2018
Autocentre Summer Academy 2016, HMKV, Dortmund, DE, Aug - Sept 2016, class of Marco Roso (DIS)
Leverhulme Arts Scholarship, Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge, July - Aug 2015
Into The Wild, Chisenhale Studios, London, Oct - Dec 2014

Publications

HMKV Videos des Monats 2014-2020, Exhibition Catalogue, 2020
Survey, Jerwood Space, Exhibition Catalogue, 2018
Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2018, Exhibition Catalogue, 2018
Chris Alton: Changing Ourselves, Changing the World, published by Quaker Books, 2018
The Catlin Guide 2015

Press & Interviews

White Devil, Episode 6: The Long Shadow, Campside Media, hosted by Josh Dean, 27/05/2024
BBC Radio Sheffield, interviewed by Paulette Edwards, 01/05/2024
BBC Radio Sheffield, interviewed by Paulette Edwards, 18/04/2024
Grief Must Be Love with Nowhere to Go: In Conversation with Emily Simpson and Chris Alton, Amelia Crouch, Corridor8, 11/03/2024
Chris Alton: Throughout the Fragment of Infinity That We Have Come to Know, Lesley Guy, Corridor8, 03/2020
Parade, Sara Makari-Aghdam, thisistomorrow, 21/01/2020
Dissenting Voices, Disobedient Gestures, Iris Aspinall Priest, Jerwood Arts, 09/2019
“A showcase and a kind of challenge” Survey: Reviewed, Mike Pinnington, The Double Negative, 23/06/2019
Bloomberg New Contemporaries review, Matthew Collings, London Evening Standard, 04/12/2018
London’s emerging artists at Jerwood, George Vasey, Burlington Contemporary, 07/11/2018
Brighton Photo Fringe: Chris Alton, interview by Idil Bozkurt, 22/10/2018
Young Artists in Conversation: Chris Alton, interview by Harry Meadley, 10/2018
Chris Alton & Liam Geary Baulch: The Ballad of The White Ship, Saffron Ward, Corridor8, 13/08/2018
Feature: Crudely Plucking the Strings, CCQ Magazine, Issue 15, 08/2018
Ey Up: Chris Alton, Harry Meadley, 09/07/2018
Review of MEANWHILE, LOWER.GREEN, Norwich, Sarah Lowndes, Enclave Review, 07/2018
The Swarthmore lecturer interview: Chris Alton, Ian Kirk-Smith, The Friend, 03/04/2018
Chris Alton: ‘By bringing different artists together...’, Hatty Nestor, Studio International, 07/09/2017
Disco isn't dead..., Max de Haldevang, Quartz, 23/08/2017
Exciting young British artists to look out for in 2017, Jessie Thompson, London Evening Standard, 16/02/2017
An Unknown Rhythm 'n' Blues Band Called Trident, Resonance FM, London, 04/2016
Meeting the Founder of the EDL, Régine Debatty, We Make Money Not Art, 24/12/2014
We support the EDL..., Oli Keens, Time Out London, 02/07/2013
International Disco Latin, Hito Steyerl, e-flux, 05/2013
How to disco dance the EDL off Google and Facebook, Dorian Lynskey, The Guardian, 01/02/2013

Collections

London College of Communication (LCC), Special Collection
The Portico Library, Manchester
Private Collections (UK, USA, Germany)