The Rescue of the Painter ( with Serota watching) Print

I was born in the naval port of Chatham, Kent and grew up amongst the pubs and drinking establishments of the cockney riviera. Violence defined my childhood, in the towns I lived in drugs and alcohol addiction were endemic. The first time I saw a beer glass smashed in someone’s face, I was five years old.In primary school, I began making drawings of my experiences. This was a process which continued over a period of thirty years, through crime, detention and release. I used the method of externalisation through the visual image as a way of understanding my own vulnerability and freeing myself from the destructive behaviour which dominated my life. During my teenage years, I began making paintings and constructing the frames from wood. I used paint economically, working primarily in acrylic with six basic colours and mixing them. I began what became an autobiography in the form of painting, using only my direct experiences in crime, sex and violence, portraying the sailors, pimps and prostitutes I associated with. In 1999, I became involved with Stuckism, the first Remodernist art group and since then, I have exhibited my paintings in every major Stuckist show since, both nationally and internationally. From this period to the present, I have developed and expanded my work to draw on elements from my Romany and Jewish ancestry, depicting stories from the Old Testament and the Kabballistic tradition as well as themes such as the Russian Revolution and the cycle of nature. My position is one of perseverance, of keeping going. I am essentially a narrative painter and part of a tradition of artists seeking to understand and define the human condition. For many years, I moved between crime and art. Eventually, I made the only decision worth making and chose art.