Adecade onfromhisrecord-breakingNationalGalleryshow,the
Kent-bornpainterreveals howhedevelopedamoreexpressiveway
ofworking.Interview:STEVEPILL10 MINUTES WITH...Clive Head
Your latest body of work feels like a departure from the
precise realism of your 2010 exhibition at London’s
National Gallery. What prompted the change?
I see it more as a development from those urban landscapes
shown at the National Gallery. My understanding of being
an artist has always been underpinned with a relentless
questioning and a desire to get nearer to the truth. A
snapshot taken in 2010 and one taken now would suggest
a huge shift, but it would be more accurate to say that
there has been a steady progression.
One of the problems was a common assumption that the
paintings were photorealist. I knew that I had to make my
work more explicit in intent. My spatial and temporal
concerns are certainly more obvious now.
The exhibition catalogue includes a drawing for Dante via
Bank. Could you tell us a little about this planning stage?
It might be misleading to see the drawing as a planning
stage. Or it might be better to see the drawing as having
two purposes. Most of my paintings begin with a heavily-
worked drawing, so in that sense, they act as a preparatory
study, but I also regard them as absolute works in their own
right. I can work on a drawing for days, way beyond what
would be needed for the bare bones to begin a painting.
How many drafts and redrafts does a typical composition
go through?
Everything I make, from the smallest drawing to the
three-metre canvases, goes through numerous stages,
drafts and redrafts in order to generate possibilities and
resolve them. At the outset, I have no preconceived
composition or narrative. To use a well-worn phrase, I take
a line for a walk and see where it leads me. If you look at
some of the drawings, it has often led me off the edge of
the paper and I have had to add a new sheet.
There are many references to mundane London life in the
new paintings like trains or houses. Do you spend a lot of
time gathering reference imagery?
I do, but I try not to think about drawing and taking photos
for an artwork. The purpose is just to record some of my
experience. For example, I might record having breakfast
and catching a train by taking a stream of photographs.
It is from that mundane experience that I might find
something, initially perhaps through layering and
juxtaposing some imagery, which transcends the ordinary,
or resonates with me on a more profound and personal
level. The reference material is just a catalyst to get started
and doesn’t remain in the studio for long.There are echoes of Cubism and Picasso’s Les
Demoiselles d’Avignon in your new work. Is that a period
of art you looked to build upon in particular?
I have always had a great passion and interest in art
history, but I think I have stumbled into this dialogue with
some of those modernist giants like Picasso because of
shared interests in the studio. And I do regard that period
of art history as the most vital and relevant to our own
position in history. There is so much to learn and build
upon from that modernist spirit.How has your technique developed over the last 10 years?
The current paintings have a more active surface, more
textured, and with a lot of colour variations. I have become
increasingly fascinated by the act and activity of painting,
pushing paint around to find the unexpected. If there is a
broader tip to pass on it would be to be more trusting of
one’s own creativity and take more risks, though this also
requires a willingness to scrape back and overpaint.Do you have any technique tips you might share?
For the recent works I have found it useful to pre-mix a
palette of colours prior to applying them to the canvas. It
separates the craft of colour mixing from the activity of
painting. I use a small number of tubed colours from which
to mix about 30 colours. The basic palette consists of
Viridian, Alizarin Crimson, Cerulean Blue, French
Ultramarine, Burnt Umber, Venetian Red and Indian Yellow.And what about when it comes to applying the paint?
I use large filbert hogs and painting knives. A knife will
leave a more abrupt edge which can add greater definition
and sparkle. I continue to use Flake White which
contributes to the surface build-up and, of course, speeds
drying. But it is time that creates the surface. The canvases
are often begun with quite dilute paint but as I continually
return in a struggle to find an elusive form, the surfaces
become denser and more fractured. It’s a quality that is not
through design but a consequence of continual questioning.
But then I have learnt that painting is like that. If you ask
the right questions, the painting will take care of itself.
Clive’s new exhibition, From an Indian Summer and
Other Seasons, runs from 24 September to 18 October at
Waterhouse & Dodd, London W1. http://www.clivehead.com