Bryn Sutcliffe creates portraiture using paint, pastel, pencil, chalk and charcoal. Alongside more traditional forms of portraiture Sutcliffe also creates distinctive images using mark making with a looser, freer feel. He has recently moved from a sombre black and white palette into exploring a colourful range of pigments. Sutcliffe constantly experiments with different materials and processes recently he has played with the heavy use of linseed oil, which tears through oil paint like water does to acrylic, but the linseed lingers far longer. We discussed his wide range of influences and techniques:
1) Which art movement do you consider most influential on your practice?
Bizarrely I actually like cubism, but this has little to no influence on my work. I love the concept of Einstein's theory of relativity and its link to creating cubism artworks. I certainly intend to look at this for influence in the future. I don't believe any particular art movement has had a direct influence on my work.
2) Where do you go and when to make your best art?
I work at my home studio and Chester Art Centre, where I am currently the permanent artist in residence, but the places I travel to in my mind are often Lovecraftian in nature. Having such a vivid imagination, a natural part of my character is to live in an overly romantic daydream, with barely a link to reality, if I'm not careful I can lose myself easily. My work is often the only thing, that I feel can connect me to this world, as well as being my constant attempt to feel something like a point in being in it at all.
3) How do you describe your 'creative process'?
Unpredictable, I struggle to be methodical, my mind is naturally obsessive and strongly believes in skill based, time-consuming work, which is usually methodical in nature, and here a great collision explodes, as I always want to start but get so easily distracted by new ideas and directions. My mind also tries to put my work in categories constantly, this often causes me a lot of unnecessary anguish, my nude artwork, in particular, is constantly trying to break out of these boxes and ideas, looking for a new approach, one that I can't control - this often leads to something far more interesting anyway.
4) Which artist, living or deceased, is the greatest inspiration to you?
Well, the obvious answer is Francis Bacon and his influence on the game Silent Hill (which was my initial inspiration to becoming a fine artist). More recently I have discovered the work of Istvan Sandorfi, his hyper-realism with its cleverly constructed otherworldly fogs, with areas missing or disappearing, I find fascinating, beautiful and slightly unnerving.
5) If you weren't an artist, what would you do?
I don't like to think about this, but being realistic I am learning to become a farmer, as this seems to be a logical next step, but I'll always be an artist, I feel I don't have any say in the matter, I know I wouldn't be able to live at all, if I couldn't create my own world.
6) What do you listen to for inspiration?
I am a fanatical David Bowie fan and find his music indescribable in artistic merit, to me the lyrics, although often make no literary sense, somehow make perfect sense to me. This is something I'm yet to understand myself, so I don't expect anyone else to understand.
7) If you could own one artwork, and money was no object, which piece would you acquire?
The Resurrection of Titanium White by Istvan Sandorfi.
8) If your dream museum or collection owner came calling, which would it be?
I care far more about the person or collector genuinely loving my work than choosing an established name but if I had to, being a Chelsea supporter, I'd have to say, Roman Abramovich, as I know he has a private collection including a triptych by Francis Bacon.
9) What is your key piece of advice for artists embarking on a fine art or creative degree today?
Quoting David Bowie "Never play to the gallery" and I would say don't expect anything to be handed to you.
10) What is your favourite book of all time (fiction or non-fiction)?
This is hard I can't say one. so it's either The Fog by James Herbert, Necronomicon by H.P Lovecraft or The Books of Blood Volume 1-3 by Clive Barker.
11) If you could hang or place your artwork in one non-traditional art setting, where would that be?
Probably a hallway in the abandoned town of Silent hill.
12) What was the biggest lesson your university course or time studying taught you?
People have very different ideas of art and no one view or idea can ever be right.
13) And finally, if we were to fast forward 10 years, where would we find you?
A truthful answer would be I have no idea, but I'd love to be even more established than I already am, but more importantly, I want to be happy in my own skin, but I like to keep things just in today and just for today.
