Aug 14, 2009

Martin Adams

The first reply I got to my info request was from Martin Adams so his is the dubious honour of being the first featured artist on the E17 Art Trail Blog. As you will see from the responses below Martin is a very busy man, involved in not one but four different Art Trail projects.....

1. Please tell us about the work you will be showing in the 2009 E17 Art Trail?

I will be showing in two exhibitions in the Trail, the first The Art of Politics is a group show dealing with the artists’ interaction with society. I hope to be showing two 3D pieces: one dealing with the Israeli invasion of Gaza and the other dealing with corruption in high places and low ones. That show is in the Changing Room Gallery in Lloyd Park from the 31st of August to the 6th of September.

The other show I am involved with is a joint show with Anna Alcock called Lino-Cut, it is in the Red Room at the Rose and Crown from the 11th to the 14th of September. My part of the show is based on Darwin and is an assemblage of wildlife and a portrait of the man himself, attempting to deal with evolution and global warming in one swipe. I also have a few pieces of sculpture on show on a similar theme.

As well as this I am organising an evening talk by Dr Patrick O'Sullivan on September 8th. This will be for the Friends of the William Morris Gallery and will be about Morris as visionary.

I am also trying to organise the Waltham Forest Arts Club exhibition at Wood Street Market.

I am running a fairly tight schedule on the "Lino-Cut" exhibition. My main piece is a portrait of Darwin, which I am still cutting the lino for. I am a little held up with some of the research. Darwin was a very thorough man and he worked on the smaller things of life like pigeons, barnacles, peas and worms. I like to get the facts behind my work correct, both culturally and pictorially which inevitably means doing research. Some of this, like photos and descriptions, can be done on the internet but otherwise it’s with my sketch book looking at the real thing. I draw up a rough sketch of what I want to implement then transfer it to the lino and in the process it always alters. The alterations normally take the form of spelling mistakes as I reverse the words for printing, though fortunately not in this case. You can see the process in the photos.

What is holding me up at the moment are barnacles! From the photos and descriptions I have downloaded I have attempted to reproduce a decent looking barnacle but to no avail. So I have to make a trip to the seaside…
2. Could you have done this work anywhere, or is it specific to E17? Related to this, did you respond to this year’s Art Trail theme ‘At Home’?
Although I could have done this work anywhere the inspiration for the bulk of the Darwin show comes directly out of my garden at home, that and the William Morris Gallery. Not the toucan or the zebras but the, slugs, snails, insects, cats, foxes, hedgehogs, etc.

3. Have you participated in the E17 Art Trail before?
I have participated in the trail for the last two years.

4. How does your work this year relate to your previous artistic practice?
It is very much a continuum of my previous work both in themes and style.

5. What challenges (if any) do you face in realising this work?
My biggest challenge is the inertia of the wine bottle and finding places to exhibit.

6. Who is this work for?
I work primarily for me, but it would be sterile if I could not exhibit the work to others.

7. As well as being an artist what else do you do?
I am very active with the Friends of the William Morris Gallery, the Arts Club and Antiscrap, the latter organisation is campaigning for arts provision in the borough and to bring radical artists together to give them a voice and a place to exhibit.

8. What is your favorite place in E17?
After my garden I think my favorite places in E17 are the William Morris Gallery and Epping Forest.

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