“One to one conversations with tutors were essential to me as I’d never really had the opportunity to sit down with practicing artists before joining the course.”
“The most valuable aspect of studying at the Art School was for me the standard of tutoring and general intimacy of the school: small classes and cross departmental relations.”
What did you get up to after graduation?
I decided not to do an MA after graduating so spent two or three years trying to find my feet. In that time I worked as a gallery technician and learnt a little bit about the commercial side of things. I continued to make work and exhibit in group shows and in 2004 Charles Saatchi bought three works which led to my first solo exhibition in 2005. I have since shown work extensively in the UK and internationally, included in exhibitions at the Museum Kunstpalast in Düsseldorf, the Venice Biennale and the Reykjavik Art Museum. Collections include The Olbricht Collection – Berlin, the Salsali Private Museum – Dubai, and the Wellcome Collection – London.
I left London in 2011 and now work from a studio on the North coast of Cornwall where I grew up. I keep close ties with London and beyond and continue to exhibit regularly – most recently in a group exhibition curated by Kathleen Soriano at Somerset House. I have also started to focus on public commissions.
What really staid with you from your time at the Art School?
One to one conversations with tutors were essential to me as I’d never really had the opportunity to sit down with practicing artists before joining the course. Often they were bewildering as I arrived with all sorts of presumptions in mind. I clearly remember for example when a tutor approached me and questioned whether a work I was half way through making might in fact already be finished. This completely threw me but I put the work down and in hindsight I know that this was one of the first works that truly relates to what I do now. There were many conversations like this that I still reflect on.
The most valuable aspect of studying at the Art School was for me the standard of tutoring and general intimacy of the school: small classes and cross departmental relations.
About the pieces above:
Mud Form, 2015, River Avon mud, 12 x 9 x 9cm. Black Country Rhythms, a twenty six by five meter wall work by Richard Long shown at The New Art Gallery in 2014 has been de-installed and compressed in to a cylindrical form.
Untitled (oak), 2013, oak, 50 x 750 x 200cm. Two boughs have been removed from an oak tree, de-barked, and joined trunk end to trunk end using a traditional carpentry joint.
So Linear, 2011, eggs, wenge, 23 x 95 x 79cm. Birds eggs have been systematically encapsulated within a wooden holding structure.