Magnus Reid

Perth, Australia / Mallorca, Spain

Magnus Reid started painting after restaurant service in London. A chef with another way to get his hands dirty. Born in Perth and self-taught, he works through layered color, rough surfaces and floral forms that can get stranger the longer you look. There’s usually something else happening beneath the petals.

His SOMOS residency gave him room to follow it. Sun-headed figures, scenes drawn from ritual and details scraped back into the paint began taking shape, later developed further in Mallorca. The flowers had company. Magnus kept the texture and opened up the story, leaving enough unresolved for you to make your own way through it.