Art School – Page 2 – ARKS, ADAM AND AXARQUIA

One of the things which really got up the noses of most of the tutors at St Martin’s was conventional drawing. They hated it so much that during my second year they actually closed down the life drawing studio, meaning that St Martin’s was the only one of the six UK major art schools without one – even Chelsea and Royal College maintained life drawing classes.

But I was a drawer. I had been since I was five years old (when my primary school headmaster described me as “the complete draftsman and cartoonist”). And fortunately for me I was not alone. Of our year of thirty odd students around ten others felt as I did, and because in those days we all received generous grants we were able to raise the funds between us to pay a model and support a once-a-week life class – much to the irritation of our tutors.

As in my first year there were a couple of tutors who bucked the general trend and attempted at least to teach and encourage us poor representational fools. Anthony Whishaw was my personal tutor that year and was always polite and gentle, despite the fact he was obviously repressing his frustration with me the whole time he was in my space. Gary Wragg was also incredibly affable and hugely encouraging, even if a bit hard to comprehend. On occasion he would stand in front of the canvas I was currently working on, gesticulate wildly with his arms and say things like, ‘Now that’s what I mean man! That’s what I’m talking about! Man, this is where it’s at!’ and so on (I always had the feeling with Gary that he thought he was on the set of a Shaft movie)… Not exactly constructive, but well meant, and I think – sincere. I believed I was Gary’s token representational artist, and I took that as a huge compliment given the whole weird context of me being at St Martins.

Anyhow, the drawings displayed below are from that time. No nudes represented here, although they will appear in future posts (I promise!) but rather an example of my portrait sketching. During this period while I was still searching for a satisfactory method of painting, I began each morning with an hour or so of sketching. Mostly, my own face but often a friend or girlfriend would be happy to sit for me if I provided them with a cup of tea or coffee as payment. It was a useful exercise and loosened me up for the rest of the day.

Ever the expressionist, subtlety was never my thing, but despite a slight heaviness of hand I’m surprised now, some 35 years later how fresh and alive these drawings appear. I hope others will agree…

My time at St Martins, from 1978 to 81 can roughly be divided into three periods, one for each year spent there, more or less, or though there are of course some overlaps.

Going to St Martins was a major error on my part. I was so flattered at being accepted that I totally overlooked the fact that I was a firmly representational painter entering an establishment at the forefront of non-representational and conceptual art. Both Slade and the Royal Academy School had both showed strong interest in me and either would have been perfect fits but I thought that St Martin’s was where the glory was and as an 18 year old wannabee William Turner, boy, did I crave glory.

I realised the gravity of my mistake within the first week there, when the irritation with me from nearly all the tutors was palpable as I resolutely stuck to my representational guns. There were two notable exceptions though – Jennifer Durrant and Henry Mundy who both took pity on me. Jenny wasn’t any happier with my painting than her colleagues but at least her approach was gentle persuasion rather than bullying. Henry – despite his international stature – was simply a mench who instead of trying to mould me in his own image gave me practical and accessible tips as to how develop the skills I already had.

The images here illustrate that development and are in part at least a testament to Henry Mundy’s kindness and astute understanding of who, and what I actually was. In his opinion at least, I was a “gifted colourist”, and it was this ability in particular which he helped me to hone. Henry’s influence is graphically illustrated in two images posted here – the two views out of my studio window of the local Soho roof tops. The first is all monochrome and gloomy – before Henry had ever set foot in my space and it well reflects the same gloominess of my mood. The second one was more or less the same but in browns. However, the tiny daub of emerald green in the window was the result of the very first piece of advice he ever gave me and, from then onward I was liberated, as the rest of the “gallery” posted here clearly shows.

The heavy impasto though is all mine.