Lubitel's back.

How circumstances affect your studio practice.

I'm certain that figurative art is the form for me, but I only allowed myself to explore this when I started teaching life drawing. In this instance it was definitely a homecoming and I shudder to imagine the work I might have made had this not happened. I'd been making various abstract things which could be considered figurative, but only by dealing with full on representations did I get to do away with a lot of the contrived abstraction in my work.

Last year I won an award for my portrait 'Rag and Bone' and this award entailed getting a bronze cast made. The upshot was that I abandoned my large carved wooden figure and started making clay portraits.

Around this time I'd also been exploring an idea using bellows structures in conjunction with the figure to express my relationship with breathing. This too became less prominent in my mind with the portrait award. It has been one of those themes I thought I might dip into periodically but lately I'd come to think of it as a diversion from being a purely figurative artist. I really admire the purity and simplicity that someone like say, Freud, has in their approach. When I have these ideas which might seem slightly abstract or surreal (ugggh!) I often reflect on them with uncertainty and distaste.

Any road, a curator contacted me today. We've been trying to sort out a suitable date for me to exhibit with him for about 18 months, but the space doesn't really suit my portraits and smaller work. There are some huge walls which are crying out for large drawings. In one conversation the Lubitel project is suddenly back on, with my aim of making  about 6 very large scale drawings for a show in Oct/ Nov 2012.

And I'm not scared...