Semple has sent "Happy Clouds" up into the sky over London initially in direct response to the recession and also in a bid to highlight and spread happiness worldwide, being invited to repeat the artwork in Dublin, Moscow, Australia and Milan. "
I know at times like this it's easy to make creativity a low priority, but I want to show on a very human level that an artistic idea might be able to do something important, even for a fleeting moment." "
I don't see why we couldn't spread the happy clouds around the world a bit."

Large scale positive public artworks around this theme of happiness has included "Jump", where Melbourne's Federation Square was transformed into an open air white cloud-like trampoline that invited adults to join in.
In 2016 "Something Amazing", was held in 6 cities in England and Scotland, who found giant coloured helium balloon sculptures dotted through streets at sunrise, and encouraged people to take and share screenprinted balloons which featured artwork of his yet to be born nephew.
The work was discussed by Matilda Battersby in The Independent in context artists including Frida Kahlo, Tracy Emin and Semple tackling the taboo subject of infertility.


Eric Bryant debated Semple and contemporary Pop Art in a seminal ARTnews feature 50 years after Richard Hamilton had defined the movement. "
While earlier generations of Pop artists exhibited a similar love-hate relationship with consumer culture and glamour, this group takes on fear and violence."
Semple's relationship with current culture, politics and imagery has put him at the forefront of the next generation of debate, where artists now tackle the current climate of fear; "his often disturbing, even sinister works also feature guns, pills, and frequent references to suicide."
In being categorised within Pop Art, Aidan Duane debated in The Irish Times how his work brings it up to date.

There is a real intelligence at the heart of his art.
On the one hand he clearly embraces the throwaway, famous-for-15-minutes soundbite culture of celebrity and distraction.
On the other, he stops it in its tracks, recasting its giddy imagery in the slow, fixed medium of paint.
He might seem to celebrate it, but he actually doesn't quite trust the world of mass production and communications.
His work implies a conviction that there is, or perhaps there better be, something genuine, something real, beyond the glam facade of throwaway culture.

 In Vogue Italia Stuart Semple discusses his critical relationship with Pop culture in a post Warhol society where it has become a universal language but aims to act removed.

Semple discussed in his Guardian blog the influence of growing up in the 1980s and how that period is vital for our art, seeing "youth culture was a powerful force, bright, seductive and ultimately a lot less hollow".
He comments about the rise of the new advertising class that has been replacing our social connections after Thatcherism by "associating products with personal empowerment" which was brought about by "a time of intense atomisation and individualisation to the detriment of community caused a pop cultural language centered around nurturing the ego."

Topics of youth apathy were touched upon in 2014's "Anxiety Generation" exhibition where Semple debated that a risk industry keeps our current generation in a passive state of fear and consumption, not having a war or threat of nuclear destruction that our parents faced, but he feels "There is a misconception that the youth are apathetic, that they sit around playing on their Xboxes and are all connected digitally, not with the rest of the living world.
I can't think of anything more active than going out and rioting,"
In 2013, Semple talked to Josh Spero about his career and influences as part of The ICA's Culture Now series.
In 2007, when interviewed for Trebuchet Magazine, Semple described how his early experience of pop influenced his approach to art "When I was growing up in the 80s these things (cultural icons) were – I don't know if it's quite right to say they were aspirational, but they cert
Semple has sent "Happy Clouds" up into the sky over London initially in direct response to the recession and also in a bid to highlight and spread happiness worldwide, being invited to repeat the artwork in Dublin, Moscow, Australia and Milan. "I know at times like this it's easy to make creativity a low priority, but I want to show on a very human level that an artistic idea might be able to do something important, even for a fleeting moment." "I don't see why we couldn't spread the happy clouds around the world a bit."
Large scale positive public artworks around this theme of happiness has included "Jump", where Melbourne's Federation Square was transformed into an open air white cloud-like trampoline that invited adults to join in. In 2016 "Something Amazing", was held in 6 cities in England and Scotland, who found giant coloured helium balloon sculptures dotted through streets at sunrise, and encouraged people to take and share screenprinted balloons which featured artwork of his yet to be born nephew. The work was discussed by Matilda Battersby in The Independent in context artists including Frida Kahlo, Tracy Emin and Semple tackling the taboo subject of infertility.

Eric Bryant debated Semple and contemporary Pop Art in a seminal ARTnews feature 50 years after Richard Hamilton had defined the movement. "While earlier generations of Pop artists exhibited a similar love-hate relationship with consumer culture and glamour, this group takes on fear and violence." Semple's relationship with current culture, politics and imagery has put him at the forefront of the next generation of debate, where artists now tackle the current climate of fear; "his often disturbing, even sinister works also feature guns, pills, and frequent references to suicide." In being categorised within Pop Art, Aidan Duane debated in The Irish Times how his work brings it up to date.
There is a real intelligence at the heart of his art. On the one hand he clearly embraces the throwaway, famous-for-15-minutes soundbite culture of celebrity and distraction. On the other, he stops it in its tracks, recasting its giddy imagery in the slow, fixed medium of paint. He might seem to celebrate it, but he actually doesn't quite trust the world of mass production and communications. His work implies a conviction that there is, or perhaps there better be, something genuine, something real, beyond the glam facade of throwaway culture.
 In Vogue Italia Stuart Semple discusses his critical relationship with Pop culture in a post Warhol society where it has become a universal language but aims to act removed.
Semple discussed in his Guardian blog the influence of growing up in the 1980s and how that period is vital for our art, seeing "youth culture was a powerful force, bright, seductive and ultimately a lot less hollow". He comments about the rise of the new advertising class that has been replacing our social connections after Thatcherism by "associating products with personal empowerment" which was brought about by "a time of intense atomisation and individualisation to the detriment of community caused a pop cultural language centered around nurturing the ego."
Topics of youth apathy were touched upon in 2014's "Anxiety Generation" exhibition where Semple debated that a risk industry keeps our current generation in a passive state of fear and consumption, not having a war or threat of nuclear destruction that our parents faced, but he feels "There is a misconception that the youth are apathetic, that they sit around playing on their Xboxes and are all connected digitally, not with the rest of the living world. I can't think of anything more active than going out and rioting,"
In 2013, Semple talked to Josh Spero about his career and influences as part of The ICA's Culture Now series. In 2007, when interviewed for Trebuchet Magazine, Semple described how his early experience of pop influenced his approach to art "When I was growing up in the 80s these things (cultural icons) were – I don't know if it's quite right to say they were aspirational, but they cert
Stuart Semple