Born in Sussex, England, Antony also spent his childhood in Amsterdam and the San Francisco Bay Area before moving to NYC at the age of 19. In 1992, he founded the performance collective Blacklips at the Pyramid Club, and spent the next several years developing his voice and ideas on late night stages around NYC.
Antony emerged with his musical ensemble Antony and the Johnsons in 1998. In 2005 Antony and the Johnsons won the UK's Mercury Prize for the album I am a Bird Now. Ann Powers of the LA Times wrote upon the release of 2009's The Crying Light, "it's the most personal environmentalist statement possible, making an unforeseen connection between queer culture's identity politics and the green movement. As music, it's simply exquisite." In 2010, The Sun gave Swanlights 5 out of 5 stars and called Antony "one of the greatest living vocalists." The Daily News wrote, "in these intense and hushed pieces, he has created an exalted world entirely his own."
In 2006 Antony collaborated with filmmaker Charles Atlas on TURNING, a concert and live video installation. The Guardian called the Barbican's presentation of TURNING, "fragile, life affirming, and truly wonderful (five stars)." Le Monde hailed TURNING at the Olympia in Paris as "Concert-manifeste transsexuel." Since 2008, Antony has performed with symphonies throughout the world, including The London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican, The Chamber Orchestra of Sydney at Sydney Opera House, The Orchestra of St. Luke's at Lincoln Center, and the Brooklyn Philharmonic at BAM. Antony and The Johnsons' presentation of The Crying Light at the Manchester Festival 2009 was included in Klaus Biesenbach's 100 Years: A History of Performance Art, at MoMA PS1. Last summer, Antony was the musical director and a performer in the critically lauded The Life and Death of Marina Abramović, directed by Robert Wilson. This piece will tour Madrid, Amsterdam, Basel and Antwerp in Spring 2012.
Antony has collaborated with a wide-ranging group of artists and musicians including Björk, Boy George, Yoko Ono, Laurie Anderson, CocoRosie, and Lou Reed. Reed has said, "When I first heard him I knew I was in the presence of an angel." Anderson adds, "Two words and he has broken your heart. When he sings it is the most exquisite thing you will hear in your life."
Antony is also an accomplished visual artist and has exhibited his drawings at Palais Des Beaux Arts in Belgium, Isis Gallery in London, Accademia Albertina in Turin and the Triennale in Milan. In 2009 he curated a group show entitled Six Eyes at Agnès B. Galerie Du Jour in Paris, which included work by Peter Hujar, Kiki Smith, and William Basinski. In October of 2010, Antony released a book of collages and drawings, also called Swanlights, published by Abrams Image. Antony's drawings will be exhibited at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles in January 2012, curated by James Elaine. "A case could be made that Mr. Hegarty himself is following some uncharted lines as an artist and performer..." -New York Times
