Andrew Baines

• Name — Andrew Baines • Born — 1963 • Birthplace — Colchester, England • Education — South Australian School of Art • Known for — Painting • Notable Works — The Existentialist Escape of the Corporate Battery Hens • Style — Surrealism, modern, conceptual, landscape • Spouse — Jacqueline Baines (m. 1987–) • Website — andrewbaines.com/index.html

Baines was born in Colchester, England, in 1963, then migrated to South Australia with his parents as an infant. Baines grew up in the beachside suburb of Grange, spending school holidays at various other coastal places, including Coobowie on the Yorke Peninsula, Rapid Bay, Normanville and Kangaroo Island. His father was a semi-professional soccer player and electrician. His mother was a housewife, who loved painting, reading and music. He has two younger brothers. His mother placed drawing materials in his hands as soon as he could sit up and Baines showed great aptitude, astonishing a kindergarten teacher with his aerial perspective drawing of the area they lived in. He attended Grange Primary, and attended painting classes at the Henley and Grange Art Society when he was ten years old. Baines became the cartoonist for the Western Suburbs Schools Soccer Newsletter that same year, earning two dollars a cartoon. He was also an unpaid profile artist for the Grange Primary newsletter. By age eleven, he was selling pencil sketches for to teachers and parents at the Grange Primary School. He then went to Seaton High School, developed a passion for soccer player and worked for John Martin's after finishing school at the age of 16, in 1979. There he produced artwork for the "Magic Cave" and backdrops for window displays, and met his future wife, Jacqueline. In 1980 and 1981, Baines spent two years at the South Australian School of Art at Underdale, but clashes with his soccer training schedule caused him to drop out and he returned to work at John Martins.

In his twenties Baines discovered the works of Andy Warhol, David Hockney, Pro Hart and Ken Done, and saw the life he wanted. In 1984, he resigned from John Martins to start Baines Graphics (set up in 1983), producing murals, cartoons, and other artworks for high-profile companies and events, such as BP, the Australian Grand Prix and the South Australia Soccer Federation. In 1999, he became a full-time painter, on the advice of his wife Jacqueline. During the 2008 financial crisis, Baines accumulated a lot of debt, and almost found himself homeless. Baines's work has attracted media attention through his "human sculptures" on coasts around the country, which have parallels with the work of Storm Thorgerson, known for his Pink Floyd album covers. Baines' work is represented by many major commercial galleries and is held in many collections across Australia and abroad, but As of July 2022 Baines his work has not made it into the Art Gallery of South Australia. A solo exhibition, The Search for Sanity, is mounted by BMGArt in July–August 2022. As of July 2022, Baines lives and works in Grange, with his wife Jacqueline.

Amongst others, Baines has been commissioned to paint a book cover for Surf Life Saving in S.A., a wine label painting for Wirra Wirra Vineyard, a CD cover painting for ABC Classics, featuring the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra's Principal tuba player Peter Whish-Wilson, and the cover for Steven Ogden's book I Met God in Bermuda. He cites his favourite commission as a portrait of John Dawkins, former Liberal member of the South Australian Legislative Council, which hangs in Parliament House, Adelaide. In January 2023, after being commissioned by Lutheran Care to create a work of art that would highlight the plight of homeless people in Adelaide, Baines created a "living art installation" featuring seven well-known South Australians covered in gold paint, as living statues in Rundle Mall in the Adelaide central business district. Baines chose gold as a mark of irony, as it is associated with wealth. The subjects represented various forms of homelessness experienced by a variety of people, played by AFLW player Erin Phillips; Adelaide Fringe director Heather Croall; Kaurna elder Uncle Mickey O'Brien; Human Services Minister Nat Cook; and former A-League striker Bruce Djite.

His paintings have been exhibited in many private galleries, including • Accent Fine Art, NSW • Accent Fine Art, WA • Adelaide Hilton International Gallery, SA • Art Images Gallery, SA • Aviva Fine Art Gallery, Vic • Axia Modern, Vic • Bay Discovery Gallery, SA • BMG Art, SA • Framed the Darwin Gallery, NT • Gallows Gallery, WA • Glenn Gallery, SA • Greenaway Gallery, Vic • Greenhill Galleries, SA • Greenwood Gallery, Vic • Harrison Galleries, NSW • Hester Gallery, NSW • Jahroc Gallery, WA • Jenny Pihan Fine Art, Vic • Lombard Art Gallery, SA • Lynne Wilton Gallery, Vic • Maree Mizon Gallery, NSW • Monsoon Gallery, WA • Paint Box Fine Art, ACT • Pilbara Fine Art Gallery, WA • Pivotal Gallery, Vic • Raglan Gallery, NSW • Red Dot Gallery, SA • Redhill Gallery, Qld • Rembar Gallery, Vic • Richard Martin Gallery, NSW • Rushcutters Bay Gallery, NSW • Stafford Studios of Fine Art, WA • Xanadu Gallery, WA • Shayne Gallery, Montreal, Canada • Karin Weber Gallery, Hong Kong • International Surrealism Now, Lisbon, Portugal • Artery Gallery, St Andrews, Scotland • Red Sea Gallery, Singapore • Galerie TOAAC Switzerland • Dart Gallery Devon, England • Blackheath Gallery, England • Susan Street Fine Art Gallery, California, USA • Gallery Diamante, California, USA • Joanne Coia Gallery, Florida, USA

Baines was appointed as an art advisor to the United Nations, and As of July 2022 is working on a project about micro-plastics in the ocean, for Harmony Day. He commits himself to two charities per year, in particular those which assist the homeless. He has imagined the concept of statues of homeless "trolley women" in the city, with QR code that lead to the stories of their lives.

A 2009 episode of Landline features Baines's interest in painting cows. Ash Starkey uploaded a three-minute screener to YouTube in 2010, which contains scenes from a half-hour documentary, Edge of Nothingness, that he made about Baines. In 2013, Photography Life released a one-minute time lapse film on Vimeo of Baines setting up his installation, Doorways to Potential, on Henley Beach in South Australia. Anna Creoddity released a short film (2014) on YouTube called Art Day! Andrew Baines, in which she shows and discusses his art work. In 2014, Baines, Aaron Schuppan and Carlo Petraccaro, produced a short film called Escape of the Corporate Battery Hens, which shows many South Australian identities in unguarded moments, including Amanda Vanstone, Steven Marshall, Vickie Chapman and Kirsten Alexander, former mayor of the City of Charles Sturt. The film, along with a short documentary, The Existentialist, about Baines' philosophy on life and art, were screened at The Arts Theatre in Angas Street, Adelaide, on 18 January 2015.