Chris Briscoe

Chris Briscoe was a British artist born in 1947. He trained as a sculptor and created kinetic work that used computer-controlled systems. In the 1970s he began using computers in his artistic practice. In 1974 he set up the computing and experimental department at the Slade School of Fine Art at University College London, where he worked across fine art, film, electronic music and computer technology. During this period he also consulted for UCL’s engineering, computer science and medical physics departments, contributing to early 3D graphics used in cranio-facial surgery. B

Briscoe was involved with some of the earliest uses of computers in art in the United Kingdom. He contributed to Working Information 3 in 1978 with computer-assisted drawings and audio works generated on a system he programmed that year. Briscoe also played a significant role in the early development of CGI in Britain. He founded Digital Pictures, described as the first 3D computer graphics facility in the country, and later co-founded Primal Pictures, where he helped develop a medically accurate 3D model of human anatomy used in education and clinical training. 

He exhibited at FISEA in 1988 and presented a 3D visualisation project at SIGGRAPH that modelled the function of the human heart. His computer-assisted drawings from 1980 and 1981 are held in the Arts Council Collection, and his work appeared in the Curwen Slade Print Portfolio produced for UCL’s 150th anniversary. Briscoe passed away in Palma de Mallorca, Spain.