An early foray into sculpture: The Three Graces

One of the things I love about Johnny is his alternative point of view and from which I've learned a lot. This is one of Johnny's experiences that not only made me laugh (It is the way he tells them.) but which opened the door to a different way of thinking.

Back in the 70s, as well as painting, Johnny was dabbling in sculpture.  'The thing is,' says Johnny, 'my sculptures always sold - especially when I was hard up.  But,' he emphasises, with  heavy pause and significant stare, 'they were crude, all wrong - but - they were appealing.'

Johnny was commissioned by an architect to create a sculpture for a new shopping precinct in Lytham St Annes.  He recounts, 'I discussed the project with the architect and we settled on the theme of the Three Graces.  I went back to my Studio to start research and work.  I thought to myself, why is it that Faith, Hope and Charity are always depicted as impossibly beautiful young women?  External beauty is no guarantee or requirement and the ugliest woman alive can be gracious.

The Three Graces

'So, I decided to make these Graces incredibly ugly and set to work in fibreglass.  I gave them great fat buttocks and scrawny breasts - they were grotesque - but I was really happy with them.  The day came for the installation.  All the shopkeepers came out in force.  'Take it down, it's obscene,' they said.  They complained to the Council and the man they sent along said, 'It's not obscene, but it is the ugliest thing.'

'Eventually, the architect rang me up. 'Johnny,' he said, 'you'll have to take it down.'  So we organised a crew to dismantle it.  'What are you doing?' the shopkeepers asked.
'We're taking it down.'
'You can't do that - we love it - people love it - they come from all over to see it!'

Gems from Johnny

I've been trawling back through my notebooks to find a particular conversation of Johnny's.  I knew, when I closed the page, in search of something else, that I might not be able to find it again and I was right.  For two days I have searched and it has eluded me, but I know it's somewhere in the tatty red book from 2010. However, whilst reading, I have re-discovered some wonderful quotes that have lifted my sagging January spirits no end.

On technology:
' I was going to take a picture.  I got my camera going and I thought the batteries had gone - but I had my reading glasses on,' 

On audiences:
'I don't want to speak to the world - I want to speak to my community.'

On recording thoughts late at night:
'I tried writing them down in a book by the bed, but the next morning it looked like a spider had crawled around in ink. So I tried a Dictaphone - and that was like a spider had crawled around in ink.'

On genetics:

Last summer!

'Both my grandfathers were underground (miners) and oddly enough, I am too.'

On Foreign Affairs:
'America always finds out six months too late and bombs the country next door.'

On life:
'When I'm dead, it's immaterial.'

On career:
'I've worked all my life to get into the basement.'

I've always been an artist ...

African

'I've always been an artist - my father was an artist - we didn't get on - but I was captivated by his art books - early English water colours.  I found out at school that I had some talent.  I never aspired - it just happened.  I could have gone to Art School from school - but I hated school.

The artist was a remote character that I read about in books.  I just loved it - always doing paintings just to prove how crap you are.  I evolved into an artist.  I have not aspired to anything other than to get up and paint.  I can't paint when I'm drunk.  I'll paint when sober and then after a few drinks, it's a different delusion.  I don't create 'to plan'.  I start layering paint on paint - it may take years - the image comes from the layerings of paint.'

Deadlines

'I've spent a great deal of my life waiting for paint to dry,' says Johnny.  While so occupied, he creates mobiles.

Last night, by chance, the 'Exhibition Group' coincided at the Brasserie for early doors.  For the next five and a half months, Clive and Sarah have the interesting task of aligning Johnny with 8th June, E (Exhibition) Day.  One of the challenges being faced, is which paintings will feature in the exhibition.

When all this started two years ago, Johnny was of a mind to hold a retrospective.  It was his seventieth birthday and he was retrospective.  'Let's do it!' said Clive, 'the paintings are painted - all we need is a venue and we're off!'  Bloody marvellous, I thought, no panic about deadlines then.  Since then, Johnny has crept slowly and inexorably, from retrospective to prospective and the knock-on effect is that we have not escaped deadlines at all.

On the plus side, Johnny's Studio is groaning under the load of paintings already completed and (most importantly) in frames, so there can be no twiddling.  There is no shortage of works to hang, however they are not necessarily paintings that Johnny wants to include in the exhibition.

I am told by Johnny that a work that emerges in last minute creative fervour, is known as 'the wet one'. Many famous artists have hung their paintings in this state.  Apparently, in the days of Constable and Turner, the Royal Academy gave artists a day's grace, after hanging, to add finishing touches to their paintings. The rivalry between Turner and Constable was intense and the story goes that Turner was dismayed by the quality and significance of Constable's painting 'the Opening of Waterloo Bridge'.  His own work, the seascape 'Helvoetsluys' seemed dull by comparison.  However, not to be outdone, at the last minute, Turner added a bright red buoy to the foreground of his shades of North Sea-grey painting and won the day.  Apparently he was proving a point that less is more and by comparison Constable's painting seemed overworked and busy.  Unfortunately, he lends weight to Johnny's 'crucial mark in last minute' attitude - it's hard to argue with Turner.

Thankfully, Big Foot is glazed, because if it wasn't and was still a work in progress, I feel it could well have been 'the one'.  I know that we are not safe from 'the one' and as I write, somewhere in the Studio, or in Johnny's subconscious lurks 'the one' that will drive all those involved in meeting deadlines bonkers.

One of these?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1215250/Revealed-180-years-The-Turner-painting-upstaged-Constable-reignited-rivalry-painters.html

Happy New Year!

When I started this blog this time last year, the plan was for an exhibition in May/June 2013.  Writing for 6 months seemed do-able.  Then May moved to October and October moved to June 2014.  I am learning about the discipline of writing and find myself lacking!

Johnny rang yesterday afternoon to catch up.  I haven't seen him over Christmas.  He spent Christmas in the Studio.  'When everyone else is occupied with something else and I'm not, I'm on the outside and I can work well,' he reported.  'I'm spending New Year's Eve on my own, quietly - I've done this for the last three years.  I like to reflect on the year and I know when I wake up tomorrow morning, the exhibition is this year - psychologically that will turn me on.'

Bloody marvellous!