PAINTINGS AND DRAWINGS

I’ve been drawing since a very early age. I remember going to my grandparents and they always encouraged me to draw, and also supplied me with lots of drawing pads or paper. I remember creating shadows, reflections and shading for objects out of my imagination probably as early as five years old – I would draw as often as I had free time, usually with a simple plastic biro pen – and it never entered my head to use pencils! This gave my early drawings a ‘look’ that was nearer to etchings (see my ‘Owl drawing’ in drawings and studies, at age 13). I would also illustrate my own books of butterflies and moths – the details of each species would encourage me to use coloured pens or pencils. Sometimes I would draw detailed cartoons for my friends, though they were probably nearer to graphic novels by the time I finished them….

In those early days, I can't really remember at which point I graduated from drawing to painting and sculpture. I used to create small sculptures for my own pleasure out of anything I could find – paper, card or plasticine – and I would often finish my small sculptures off by painting them, to add an element of life/or realism. It might seem a strange practice to finish sculptures off by painting them, but it’s something I still do today with my golf sculptures figurines. If we go back in time to look at many ancient sculptures within the history of art, many sculptures from Ancient Greece or early Christian Sculptures were also painted to add a layer of realism.

When I went to College to study art in the mid 1980’s, the best thing we did was draw from the model every day, probably for the whole first year of my BA course. I can’t say that the other tuition gave me much in terms of knowledge of technique or new skills – these days Art Colleges spend a great deal of time on theory and encouraging students to try different ‘isms’. The classical skills such as being able to draw in proportion, understand perspective or the ability to see the structure of objects or the structure of the human figure was often left alone: usually meaning that if you don’t have these skills when you start a course, you’ve not much chance of improving your skills or knowledge by the end of the course. I was recently reading a book by a commercial sculptor who went to Art College in the 1950’s and his opinion was intriguingly similar – students were encouraged to study the course of modern Art (a nice idea) but basic skills such as casting and mould-making were left alone.

More to follow soon…..