Art Speak
Each month a new featured artist bares his/her soul and shares inspiring, profound and helpful insights into their daily practice, about how they found their own style/voice on their varied paths to becoming professional artists.
Alex McCarthy in Conversation
2022.04.15
Alex McCarthy chats about his route to becoming a full-time ceramic artist, some of his techniques and what he thinks... See more
Watch the videoThere are fashions that come all the time. And some people get sucked up into that. You’ve got to be careful. Just paint who you are.
Paul Wadsworth
It’s about not worrying about starting something, making a mark, a colour! It’s simple steps, and learning to control it – controlling the drip!
Maxine Hart
When you’ve got a white canvas and you’re chucking paint on, it’s very seductive. You’ve got to go past it … just move on because there’s a more amazing painting somewhere to be had.
Paul Wadsworth
I thought, maybe I can move to New York and incorporate whatever that magical New York dust … does for me and my work.
Robert Szot
I can work on Mars? I have a studio? That’s okay then.
Robert Szot
The best artists are the best editors.
Robert Szot
There’s nothing quite like feeling you’re not wasting your time to keep yourself motivated.
Robert Szot
There’s nothing more interesting than your own voice, than the individual.
Robert Szot
I'm interested in how people put paint on the canvas, because that tells me everything I need to know about them
Paul Wadsworth
I am going back to that ‘being-at-art-school’ feeling, where I’m trying to get over the feeling of being too precious about something, of keeping going, but not pushing it too far.
Maxine Hart
I love that painting can transcend distance and time, and I wanted to be a part of that, to talk in that language.
Robert Szot
I can eat butter? NASA send the Buttership!
Robert Szot
I’m also interested in exploring the crossover point between what makes a landscape or an abstract painting, because when I’m at the coast or on the moor the two can so easily blur together. As well as wanting a level of accuracy in my work, I enjoy reconfiguring what I’m seeing to help express my emotions.
Saul Cathcart
It brings such a lot of joy into your life to feel you’re doing something that has purpose, and that’s worth your time … and that could be anything!
Robert Szot
I get to confess everything … through abstraction.
Robert Szot
I’m interested in how people put paint on the canvas, because that tells me everything I need to know about them.
Paul Wadsworth
Find something small to wrap your life around.’ Robert Szot
Robert Szot
It’s about finding that one small thing that you are so passionate about, that little ember that burns so deeply inside of you, and really wrapping every decision you make around that, as much as you can.
Robert Szot
Painting’s my life, it’s my living. It’s who I am and I like that. I like that.
Paul Wadsworth
If you don’t have the basics, you can’t go off and do something pure abstract.
Paul Wadsworth
A controlled dribble … I feel I’m that! Yes, I’m a controlled dribble. It’s all about letting things happen, but not too far!
Maxine Hart
Colour is important to me. Some colours (not always in view) just feel right for the moment in which the painting is being made and this fascinates me. I find it is important to listen to my intuition but in the same breath be able to realise what a painting needs.
Saul Cathcart
It is a difficult thing to dive that deeply into your own psyche – you’ll find it to be exhilarating, terrifying and rewarding, all at the same time.
Robert Szot
Find something small to wrap your life around, and nurture that small thing as much as you can.
Robert Szot
You’ve got to create failures too. If you don’t fail with stuff, then you’re not going to create the ones you really love.
Paul Wadsworth
If a turtle can live for 200 years, I can do 140, right?
Robert Szot
It starts to become about who you are, and how to put yourself into the work. That’s the important bit.
Paul Wadsworth
There are enough dark corners in my own life that I find interesting.
Robert Szot
I don’t start with any great ideas. I just start by chucking paint and colour at the canvas, and have that real playful time.
Paul Wadsworth
When you’re a mum, you’ve often just got an hour/two hours, and that is it, before you go to pick someone up. I was worried I was going to lose my creative juices, but it very much honed my skill.
Maxine Hart
It (painting) will never die out. It’s such a great way for an individual to mark their time out and to express themselves, and say “This is what was going on when I was here”.
Robert Szot
Painting takes your life and connects it to the lives of people you don’t know.
Robert Szot
The freedom I find at the coast is addictive and the sense of space feeds my creativity. For me a good painting has to capture this freedom in its construction. The paint has to have a rhythm and energy to it. My favourite paintings are the ones made with an almost brash confidence, yet at the same time hold a level of sensitivity to their surroundings.
Saul Cathcart
‘My work is about setting myself up at a place where I feel my best so I can paint my best. I need to be out in the landscape to do this. I take a great deal of time to search out locations that speak to me for multiple different reasons.
Saul Cathcart
Boy, Catherine! Way to put me on the spot! That’s a really big question!
Robert Szot
Edith Piaf will live forever and painting will live forever.
Robert Szot
The picturesque bit of your brain is going ‘Make it look like this’, and it can make you forget what painting is about, which is movement, expression.
Paul Wadsworth
Oh my God, I'm in the Tate and I think I'm going to cry.
Trudy Montgomery
Featured Interviews
In Conversation with Nicholas Wilton – Artist & Founder of Art2Life
2022.02.04Calling all artists - get ready to be inspired by one of the world's most inspirational art teachers and painters. Founder of the hugely successful CVP (Creative Visionary Programme) & FREE Art2Life workshops, in this interview, Nicholas Wilton shares his journey and techniques with generosity, sincerity and warmth.
In Conversation with Gordon Ellis-Brown
2022.01.20Photographer & mixed-media artist Gordon Ellis-Brown chats about his fascinating work which combines native art and symbolism with space-age images. He also talks about exhibiting at art fairs, Newlyn Art School's mentoring course & his passion for typography.
In Conversation with Saul Cathcart
2022.01.10In this interview I chat with popular Cornwall-based artist Saul Cathcart about his love of spray paint, pink, space ... and how he overcomes any artistic blocks.