Ian Whittlesea (b. 1967, UK) lives in London. His work is concerned with words, and with the ability of text to transform the physical and psychic state of the viewer. It assumes many forms, from painstaking paintings to printed books, ephemeral posters and transient projections, and explores the relationships between language, light, image and diagram both on the page and in the world.

Over the last 30 years his publications and exhibitions have drawn on the parallels between what one experiences when making or perceiving art and first-hand reports of transcendental experiences. Working with the texts of esoteric groups that claim self-realisation comes through control of breath and body, he has attempted to elucidate Sol LeWitt's statement: Conceptual artists are mystics rather than rationalists. They leap to conclusions that logic cannot reach.

Recent solo exhibitions include those at 1961 Projects, Singapore (2026), Glasgow School of Art (2026), Canopy Collections HQ, London (2025) and London Centre for Book Arts (2025).

Group exhibitions include Lunar Practices, Ramp, Beijing (2026), Leesmap 2, PrintRoom, Rotterdam (2025), Bauhaus: Utopia in Crisis, Nova Art Space, Bauhaus-Universität Weimar, Germany (2021), One Thing Plus Another Thing…, Tlön Projects, The Hague (2018), Performances Yves Klein, BOZAR, Brussels (2017), Now is forever lasting constant in the mind, Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven (2016), Exercises in Empathy, Site, Sheffield (2015) and Resource, Bluecoat, Liverpool (2015).