Name : Wayne Mitchelson
Location: Melton Mowbray
Website: https://wayne-mitchelson.blogspot.com/
Brief artist statement:
I create One Frame Cinema
How did you become an artist? Did you always dream of a life in the art-world?
It was a very long time ago when i was 5 years old, I was always drawing and i remember i was the first at school to draw people not as matchstick men!
From then on i was obsessed with fantasy artists like Peter Andrew Jones, Syd Mead, Brian Froud, Roger Dean. Then i was doing things like mural paintings and portraits for people, nothing serious until i went to university when i was 33 years old.
How has your education helped your career?
It didn’t help it, it started it. University is so important if you want to become an artist, it shows you the way to work, how to channel your passions and interests into art, introduces you to a world of artists, teaches you techniques, how to approach a gallery, organize an exhibition, the list is endless. One thing i will say is that when you finnish your time at art school that isn’t it, you don’t become an artist there and then, that is when the real hard work starts.
Do you work as an artist full-time? Describe your typical day. Do you have a routine?
I’m afraid its not full time at the moment, i have to do a normal job to pay the bills but im working at making it full time. Day starts early with lots of coffee, then i work on a project, i normally have a few projects on the go which i interchange during the day, I may then go and do a photography shoot, read a little, look for new artists, infact, i tend to keep to a similar routine i had when at university. I also make sure i’m looking for new exhibitions to enter, competitions or anything art related.
Which historical and contemporary artists do you refer to most often? How are you influenced by their work?
Casper David Friedrich, Mark Rothko, Edward Hopper, Gregory Crewdson and Philip lorca Dicorcia are the artists i come back to time and time again. All these artsts have in some way changed my work dramatically when i found them, its like a light has been switched on in your mind, very hard to explain but you feel this kind of connection with what they are trying to do. It doesn’t happen with every artist you discover, so it makes these artists special.
What are the other influences on your work?
Films, music and literature, Studying directors is important to me as it plays a big role in my work, framing, colour filters, locations, ideas ect. I love the works of David Lynch, Alfred Hitchcock, Michael Mann, Andre Tarkovsky and Ridley Scott, to name the main ones. In literature it is J.G. Ballard, Philip K. Dick, Cormac Mccarthy, Franz Kafka and Samual Beckett again to name the main ones. All these work their way into my work in some way, almost like a melting pot of influences.
What was the last exhibition you visited?
It was Zarina Bhimji at the Whitechapel gallery a couple of months ago, her films “Yellow Patch” and “Out the Blue” are breathtaking, you get completely submerged in the peopleless landscapes and sound.
What is your favourite art gallery?
I would have to say The Whitechapel in London, Iv seen some fantastic shows there and always come out feeling inspired. I used to love a lovely gallery in Leicester (my home town) called the City Gallery, where i did my first ever exhibition, it got closed down last year and is now a pound shop, it breaks my heart every time i walk past it.
What are your experiences of the ‘art-world’ and the business of art?
Not what i thought, you can read about the art world and about other artists but until you are in it, you have no idea. It isn’t glamorous, its hard work and sometimes demoralising, but the satisfaction and the highs far outway the bad times. Also the art world has become massive because of the internet, in some ways its a bad thing because of the huge amount of art and artists flying around the net, a big percent being not good art, but at the same time it is a good thing, it means that its allot more easy to show your art to the world with the internet. Before the net an artists would have to physically walk around with a physical portfolio and his artcwould only be seen in a gallery or a book, now it can be uploaded and e-mailed without leaving your studio.
Do you have any tips or advice you wish you had known earlier in your career?
I would say i am still very early in my career but i’m finding that having a few strings in your bow helps. When i started university i remember saying i just want to paint, thats it, nothing else, but that really isn’t realistic unless you are one of the few who make it big for your painting. I have branched out into illustration and teaching, keep your options open.
Do you have a quotation that you keep coming back to and that keep you going? Have you a motto that gets you through?
Yes one from Casper David Friedrich that describes the way he sees the image in his mind before he starts to work to get in on canvas-
“Close your bodily eye, that you may see your picture first with the eye of the spirit. Then bring to light what you have seen in the darkness, that its effect may work back, from without to within.”
Which historical artist do you think is over-rated? Why?
None, if they have been historically credited for their talent then i can’t fault them.
Do you or would you use assistants to make your work?
In a way i do when it comes to printing my work, i dont do it on my own so i suppose you could call them an assistant. Allot of artists do have help in producing their work but i don’t agree with the idea of an artist who just comes up with the idea and then passes it on to a team that then create the work, to me that is taking the artists hand or craft away from the art.
Do you use social networks? if so, how and which ones do you find most useful?
I only use Facebook and it does work, i have done a couple of record label designs just from networking on Facebook. The labels are in Germany and Argentina, so without social network, or the net, i would never had got the chance to do them. If used right, Facebook is a powerful tool. don’t just sit there and update your status with what you are eating, get in there and get yourself known with your work.
Which artist should we all look up immediately? What art magazines, blogs or sites should art lovers be looking at?
If you don’t know him then the photographer Philip Lorca Dicorsia, pure genius. I can say only one site, has to be Flaneur, keep a regular eye on all the the big gallery sites in good aswell.
Finish this limerick: There once was an artist from…
“the artists draws a map in pen on a wall with his eyes closed…… then silence”
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