Getting to Know Patrick Hughes

Next in our 'Getting to Know...' series the quirky and wonderful artist Patrick Hughes. As well as having some now very rare prints by Patrick dating from the 80S, CCA have been delighted to publish new silkscreen editions with him in recent years. Patrick currently has a retrospective of his work '50 Years in Show Business' at Flowers Gallery, London.

        CC: Describe your ethos as an artist/How would you describe your work?

        PH: My work is oxymoronic, bitter/sweet, serious/funny, simple/complicated, reasonable/daft.

        CC: What Inspires you?

        PH: I am inspired by artists and writers of a similar persuasion: Magritte, Klee, Duchamp, Kakfka, Lewis Caroll, Samuel Butler.

        CC: Did you always want to be an artist?

        PH: No I wanted to be a writer, but I thought NF Simpson's play One Way Pendulum was so perfect that I thought I should be a                  paradoxer in art where there was not so much competition.

       CC: What is an average day in the life of Patrick Hughes?

       PH: I get up at 6.30, my assistants come at 8 when I make them tea or coffee, lunch is 12.20 to 1.10, the studio colses at 4.40 Monday             to  Friday. In the evening TV or theatre or reading with my wife Di. Running around the park, playing table tennis five times a week.

      CC: Who is your favourite artist/ artwork|?

      PH: Paul Klee is my favourite artist because I never knew what he was going to do next. March of the Viaducts is one of his best.

Colour Process (1984)

 CC: What do you think of the Arts in Britain today?

PH: I never think about the Arts in Britain today, I am only interested in what I am interested in. I read the paper cover to cover every day, and watch the TV news. I am not British, I have got a Citizen of the World passport, and I am as interested in British art as I am in Croatian art or Malaysian art: nationalism is the biggest mistake of the nineteenth century, or any century.

CC: What is your favourite exhibition space?

PH: The space inside your head.

CC: What do you consider to be your greatest achievement?

PH: To have always done what I wanted to do, without studying at an art school. To have become learned by reading books silently.

CC: Which talent would you most like to possess?

PH: To run like the wind.

CC: One book to take to a desert island...

PH: A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh

CC: How would you like people to view your work in the future?

PH: Profound, witty, imaginative, unique.

CC: Name a current exhibition that you would like to see/would recommend

PH: Magritte in Liverpool, Hughes in Cork Street and Shoreditch (Flowers Gallery).

Paper Roses (1985)

Getting to Know Barbara Rae

Continiung our series of interviews with Britain's leading artists, Clare Clinton talks to Barbara Rae:

CC: Describe your ethos as an artist/How would you describe your work?

BR: My work practice is in two parts: the first is creative research including historical and geographical information, the second is studio based adaptation and development of information. Research can be a specific area of landscape, an industrial location, an interior or an object that fascinates such as a piece of Navajo weaving or a carved Pictish standing stone. The studio based work is intuitive and creative, based on written and observed knowledge but largely left behind at this stage.

Pueblo

CC: What Inspires you?

BR: History, geography and the way things have been shaped by man: landscape, cities and objects.

CC: Did you always want to be an artist?

BR: I dabbled with the idea of being a PE teacher or doing geography at university. Deeo down I knew that I would be going to Art College.

CC: What is an average day in the life of Barbara Rae?

BR: There is no average day really. When I am on location somewhere whether it is in Arizona, Spain, Ireland etc. I like to get out as soon as possible to drive around to see things and explore. I prefer to work outside in the winter months when the light is low (no blue skies or tourists). Sometimes I have to get up really early or wait until before dusk to get the best light. In my studio in Ireland or Edinburgh, I get to the studio as early as possible and get started before the phone starts to ring. There are always pleasant distractions however, such as lunch or drinks with friends!

Red Sky

CC: Who is your favourite artist/ artwork|?

BR: I enjoy folk art a lot for its naive honesty and unconscious humour. I collect these things when I can. Artists that I admire include Tapies, Rauschenberg, Warhol, Miro (no surprise that they are printmakers!). I also admire Goya and Velasquez.

CC: What do you think of the Arts in Britain today?

BR: The huge increase in art galleries has made art accessible to many more people, as has the growth in popularity of prints in all their forms. The quality is really variable and there is some excruciatingly bad work lurking in small galleries in tucked away remote places ready to ambush the unwary art lover. The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition is a good place to see a cross section of quality work. The artists' societies in Scotland show a wide variety of serious work as do the private galleries.

CC: What is your favourite exhibition space?

BR: Royal Academy, London or Guggenheim. Bilbao . The Ace Gallery in LA is pretty amazing.

CC: What do you consider to be your greatest achievement?

BR: Teaching at Glasgow School of Art in the wonderfil Charles Rennie MacIntosh building for 21 years then leaving and having my own wonderful studio space.

Quarry Edge

CC: Which talent would you most like to possess?

BR: The ability to learn languages.

CC: One book to take to a desert island...

BR: Must be the best survival manual around! Or a seed catalogue would keep me amused for many hours.

 CC: How would you like people to view your work in the future?

BR: I hope that they will enjoy it and understand that I am not a 'landscape' artist.

CC: Name a current exhibition that you would like to see/would recommend

BR: Norman McBeath and Robert Crawford exhibition, Body Bags/Simonides- Edinburgh College of Art 4 Aug until 9 Sept. Also David Mach- Fruitmarket Gallery

Sir Peter Blake designs for Fred Perry

Iconic British style enthusiasts will be delighted to here that Sir Peter Blake has teamed up with Fred Perry to redesign mod favourite Fred Perry polo shirt. It's a particularly fitting team-up- not least because Sir Peter painted himself wearing a Fred Perry under his denim workman's jacket in his 1961 work Self-Portrait with Badges. There are three different styles of shirt being released (red, white and blue- naturally), each of the three is limited to 1000 pieces and comes in a presentation box featuring Union Jack patches and screen-printed iconography, with the artist's signature on hem and neck.Using an original 1960s colour palette the three shirts feature rainbow and Union Jack patches alongside screen printed icons such as stars, hearts and targets.

Priced at £125. Visit fredperry.com to buy

Fred Perry have interviewed Sir Peter:

- What was your inspiration behind the pieces?

PB: Pop....

- Do you wear Fred Perry yourself otherwise?

PB: No, sadly I am too fat!

- What is it with the brand that you like?

PB: The symbol is the ethos of MOD...

- You work with pop art and Fred Perry is subcultural label to a degree, do you have common aesthetic grounds?

PB: As a prototype MOD in the last 1950s, early 1960s, I wore Fred Perry shirts and painted a similar shirt in my Self-Portrait with Badges.

- There are Union Jacks and other British symbols on the tops, does the collection pay national homage?

PB: I see the Union Jack in the traditional way of it being a patriotic image...

- Have you seen and liked any of the other Fred Perry Blank Canvas collaborations?

PB: Yes- I Love them!

- How would you define the relationship between art and fashion?

PB: Fashion can be art and art can be fashionable...

- What's next for you?

PB: I am making some jewellery at the moment!

John Hoyland 1934 2011

We at CCA were very sad to learn of the death of John Hoyland. I had been lucky enough to meet him on several occasions and remember a spirited and witty man full of verve. He was a convivial and irreverent neighbour at the dinner table; always ready with a forthright opinion and a funny story. I remember a few years ago at Art London John and his wife Beverley came and had a drink on board the Art Bus and ended up sitting with me for the best part of an hour, just laughing and chewing the fat.

I was also privileged enough to visit him at his home and studio in London, where he had lived and worked since the 60s, and which was full of intriguing objects from all his travels. The living space opened up directly into his studio space, in which canvases were stacked against the walls and the floors were completely covered with splatters of paint. The visit was in order to pick up an original canvas that John was donating for our British Heart Foundation Mending Broken Hearts Art Appeal. He also created an original silkscreen print for the campaign 'Soulless Stars Cascade'- generous with his time and effort for a great cause.

We are lucky at CCA to have published three silkscreen editions with John: Life and Love and Warrior Universe, as well as Soulless Stars Cascade. The titles of his works were very important to John, and I always felt that they revealed the poet in him; such beautiful meaningful and romantic titles that conveyed the full richness of the passion, exuberance and emotional depth of his work.

The Directors and staff at CCA offer our condolences to his family and friends.

Archives

• May 2012 (1)
• April 2012 (2)
• March 2012 (1)
• February 2012 (1)
• January 2012 (2)

Subscribe to
our RSS Feed