artist of the month...

Some of my early memories are of making art with my brother Henry. It seems that my talents lay in that direction, because I also remember being asked what it was I wanted to be when I grew up and replying that I wanted to be an artist. As to where and why I got that idea is more difficult to determine. There were no art museums in Bermuda and a war was on, so there was no opportunity to go elsewhere to visit art galleries, but my dad did subscribe to National Geographic and I recall seeing articles on art, especially the National Gallery in Washington, D.C. That was about the time it was established and opened to the public. Also, my father’s cousin, Hereward Watlington, was a Paris trained artist. That may have been an influence as well. By the time I was old enough to attend school, my artistic abilities were already well established and one summer, the art teacher took my brother and me and one other kid, for private art lessons. Also, I remember the French teacher giving an illustrated talk on Van Gogh that sent me in the direction of art history, which is something I taught for about fifty years.

Please describe your artistic style.

Although I had a fairly traditional training, I remember thinking as a student that it was important to develop traditional art skills, like drawing, design, and painting, but that these were only useful in that they could be applied to what I was eally interested in making. I was also interested in science and that was a big influence in what I wanted to do artistically. My twin brother had become a biologist and science teacher, but was also very artistic and I had been trained as an artist but was interested in science. My work is quite experimental. As to my personal art style, I am not sure I have one. It is more a matter of how I make what I do, that is important to me.

In June 2010 the Bermuda National Gallery opened its 9th Bacardi Biennial Exhibition of Contemporary Bermuda Art, juried by Veerle Poupeye (Director of the National Gallery of Jamaica) and Tumelo Mosaka (Curator of Contemporary Art, Krannert Art Museum). Your artwork has earned a place in all nine Biennials. Please elaborate on how the BNGs Biennial has changed throughout the years.

Looking back over the years since the beginning of the BNG Biennial Exhibitions, I suppose it is fair to say that the art has got better and stylistically and technically much more diverse. Certainly today there is far more photography in the Biennial. In the recent past, there was also installation art and I understand that there is a performance piece in this year’s show. It is probable that the Biennial has been an important catalyst in the development of the visual arts in Bermuda and today’s young artists have grown-up with far more technical opportunities then ever before. Over a lifetime of art making, I have to say that I have had an enormous amount of fun. I read or hear about all the angst that artists have in being creative, which is foreign to me. This is not to say that there is not a place for creative pain, but that I, myself, have not had to go through it in my creativity. Maybe all the non-conformity that I grew up with prepared me for such a world.