Image Credit: Photo of Jeremy Deller.

Turner Prize-winning artist Jeremy Deller has spent more than three decades making the case that culture belongs to everyone. From brass bands and acid house to miners, folk traditions and inflatable Stonehenge, his work celebrates the extraordinary creativity of everyday life, challenging who gets to make art, whose stories are told and what brings us together.

Born in London in 1966, Deller grew up in Dulwich, where childhood visits to museums, the BBC and a fascination with pop music helped shape his worldview. At 20, an encounter with Andy Warhol and a visit to his legendary Factory opened up new possibilities. Rather than follow a conventional artistic path, Deller began experimenting with interventions, collaborations and happenings. His breakthrough, Acid Brass (1997), brought together acid house and a traditional brass band, establishing an approach that would define his career.

His achievements are formidable: The Battle of Orgreave (2001), a landmark re-enactment of the 1984 miners’ strike confrontation; the Turner Prize in 2004; representing Britain at the Venice Biennale in 2013; and The Triumph of Art (2025), a nationwide celebration marking the National Gallery’s bicentenary.

Yet Deller remains wonderfully suspicious of cultural hierarchies. Reflecting on the role of emerging subcultures, he tells Run Riot: “I know they are out there somewhere, just leave them alone!” He compares well-meaning intervention to pursuing a rare animal through a forest, only to trample it.

We’re speaking ahead of his Cultural Philanthropy Foundation Thought Leadership Lecture, taking place at London’s Southbank Centre on Wednesday 18 November 2026 at 7.45pm. Exploring culture as something shared, contested and inescapably political, the lecture considers what the cultural sector might achieve through collective action, particularly when public funding, social cohesion and the value of cultural participation are under scrutiny.

For Deller, the importance of gathering across differences remains fundamental: “It’s important to be around people who you may disagree with on certain issues but you can still share something and enjoy their company.”

So here’s your invitation: visit a museum you’ve never explored, catch a local band, join a community event or take a friend somewhere unexpected. Better still, invite someone whose tastes differ from yours. As Deller reminds us, culture thrives when we share the experience.

You’ve said you had to ‘unlearn’ some of the hierarchy you absorbed at Dulwich College – what helped you see the world differently, and can culture still do that for us?

Meeting people from different backgrounds. My parents helped run a summer playscheme for young people who were not going to get a holiday otherwise and that was a important experience for me. Later, clubs and always pop music – pop music is in a sense about difference and tolerance. This was certainly the case in the 80’s but I think is still the case.

Much of your work turns audiences into participants – do we need to recover the idea that culture is something we make together, rather than simply consume?

Yes.

The evidence for the benefits of engaging with the arts is increasingly measurable – financially and our health [thinking of Daisy Fancourt’s Art Cure] – has the cultural sector been too timid in making the case that culture is part of society’s essential infrastructure [thinking of the proposed £1 billion cut to DCMS by the Conservatives]?

I actually think the arts has been very good at promoting and defending itself – we are after all communicators. But it is difficult to quantify happiness and well being.

Subcultures often develop their magic before the mainstream notices them – where are those IRL spaces and scenes emerging in Britain now, and how do we support them without ruining what makes them special?

Who knows where they are. In a sense we, as in older folk like me, should not know where they are! I know they are out there somewhere, just leave them alone! It’s like a rare animal in a forest that you hunt down to help, and end up trampling it.

You’ve talked about the BBC opening windows onto worlds you didn’t understand as a child. In an age when algorithms give us more of what we already like, who’s showing us the things we don’t know we need to see beyond social media?

Actually I see a lot of interesting things on social media, it’s just chaotic. You never know what you will be fed next. There is a calmness to TV, so to answer your question, maybe museums are a good place to look at actual objects. It’s actual evidence, if you like.

Looking at Britain in 2026, where do you see a fracture that culture could genuinely help soften – and what might bringing people together actually look like?

Well, it happens at festivals and gatherings of people at non political events. It’s important to be around people who you may disagree with on certain issues but you can still share something and enjoy their company.

Find Jeremy on Instagram @jeremydeller

Jeremy will be giving the Cultural Philanthropy Foundation Lecture, exploring culture as something shared, contested and inescapably political. This will take place on Wed 18 Nov 2026, 7.45pm at the Southbank Centre. Info and tickets → southbankcentre.co.uk

His other projects include 2026 Durham Miners Gala Art Print → buildingculture.myshopify.com