The United Kingdom, the Chair and Other Things with Stephen Chambers
April 21 2018, Istanbul
Istanbul's art enthusiasts met Stephen Chambers' art, authentic, pleasant and equally ironic like himself, thanks to the exhibition "The Big Country and Other Stories" at the Pera Museum. Since then, the world has swiftly changed; the United Kingdom said "no" to the European Union. Wars and migrations turned the demographic data upside down. During his visit to Istanbul, had a colorful conversation with Chambers on his paintings addressing all these issues.
IY: What’s your purpose of visit to Istanbul this time?
SC: I did a show at the Pera Museum four years ago and met Baha (Toygar). The main exhibit was an enormous print, probably one the biggest edition prints ever made, and Baha has a copy, the 5th edition of 6, in his collection. From there we became friends and today is the first time I’m going to see it framed and installed at his apartment.
IY: “The Big Country and Other Stories”... That show centered around that piece, The Big Country, right?
SC: Yes. The piece has been shown quite widely and was originally made for an exhibition at the Royal Academy in London.
IY: Then you had this big exhibition as a collateral event of the 2017 Venice Biennale...
SC: That was a big gig that ran from May to November last year. It’s currently in Cambridge until the end of May. They are two cities that are used to having banks of portraits. In Venice you have the portraits of the leaders of the city everywhere and in Cambridge, those of the masters of the colleges going back hundreds of years. The exhibition consists of 101 imagined portraits of the Court of Redonda...
IY: It’s partly imaginary and partly based on reality. That’s what I like about your work... Mixing them on one plane, like life itself...
SC: It’s a curious one, because when people first read about Redonda, the initial reaction frequently is that it’s quite whimsical or light-hearted; but what intrigues me is the other side of that, i.e. the references to the world we now live in and the movements of people and multiculturalism. I come from a city where the whole world arrives, so it’s very diverse. I wanted to make a comment about how a society could be if you just put different people in charge of it...
IY: You have a lot of “what if” departure points...
SC: I often describe my works as “ignition points” for the beginnings of unconcluded narratives. I rarely tell people what happens in the end. I invite them to finish it themselves.
IY: You are actually a storyteller...
SC: I think I am. I used to try to avoid the word “narrative” as it is currently quite pejorative. Actually that’s what I am! I know that I embroid a conversation with anecdotes and I guess this is just how my brain works, almost to establish a setting. I go to the theatre all the time, more than I go to the cinema. I also love cinema but in theatre I like that improvisation within a square of space; you have to make the most out of those limited means.
IY: You also designed some theatre settings yourself…
SC: I worked with The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden some years ago. I made three sets for the Royal Ballet…
IY: Your compositions are like a theatre square anyway…
SC: That’s what a writer from Berlin told me as well! It’s probably quite true.
IY: Would it be accurate to say that your work originates from a variety of storytelling traditions? Hieroglyphs in one way, comics in another… Even Boccaccio’s Decameron or Chauser’s Canterbury Tales…
SC: I’m a reflection of my experiences like we all are. I think I like playing with other people’s ideas and I recognize a good idea when I hear it. The Court of Redonda, for instance, was really a type of unfamiliar collaboration with a Spanish writer, Javíer Marias. He have actually never met in person; we exchanged letters in the old-fashioned way...
IY: Your works also have a satirical attitude… They aren’t that “innocent”, it seems…
SC: I don’t think they’re innocent at all. I feel quite strongly about things but I also have a type of “English politeness”, which perhaps results in me saying something quite hard in a humorous way. It’s probably also related to the tradition of satire in Britain going back to the 17th, 18th centuries…
IY: You tackle some very heavy contemporary subjects like migration, war, social problems…
SC: I have increasingly become impatient and thus increasingly political in many ways. Right now, Britain is quite a confused and divided country because of the Brexit vote. In my view, it was the result of reckless political opportunism.
IY: And how about printmaking? Although you’re a painter, it’s apparently a big part of your oeuvre…
SC: Yes, you’re correct. I never did any printmaking when I was a student. I started doing it quite late but it became an important part of the way I think. The size and everything…
IY: “Size matters” in contemporary art…
SC: Actually the work at the Pera Museum has to do a lot with my frustration with the contemporary print, in that printmakers are often presented with a sense of inferiority or parochialness. I did the work to empower the world of the printmakers, both in terms of the scale and the process.
IY: This inferiority is so ironic, considering the supremacy of digital editions nowadays…
SC: I don’t mind what process is used as long as the result is interesting. For instance, I make my paintings all by myself but I make my prints with the assistance of very good printers who guide me through the complicated corridors...
IY: What’s your relationship to manual labor?
SC: I’m the grafter. The paintings I make are fantastically impractical.
IY: How do your drawings relate to your paintings and prints?
SC: There are moments when I just make images. They start off quite loose. They’re a way of thinking, of realizing an idea. There are big paintings I’m doing in the studio at the moment that are based on some drawings I made ten years ago. They’re very much a revisit…
IY: Then I assume you don’t approach your body of work in terms of “phases”…
SC: That’s a good question given what I’ve just said; but in some ways I think there are phases and that the work I have been making over the last few years has certainly been different. Instead of making one painting after another independently of each other, I have begun to work with ideas and bodies of work. To make my life harder I like to keep those works together, presented as one piece of work like in the “Court of Redonda”.
IY: How long did that take to finish?
SC: About fourteen months. Another moment of clinical insanity…
IY: I also notice a change in the aesthetic elements over time. Your earlier figures are neat, detailed and now they seem much more archaic to me…
SC: I think that’s probably right, something I’m playing with now. Figures are set somewhere in an unspecified past. If I make them overtly contemporary today, than they will be out of date tomorrow. In my view contemporary art deals with the past or other eras with far greater difficulty than literature or cinema does.
IY: Contemporary artworks are consumed so rapidly and viciously…
SC: I like slowing down the experience of seeing the work, of being with the work. I’m not adverse to an impact, though; in the Big Country, for instance, there’s a lace-like pattern that runs through the entire imagery. And I see this almost like a spider web that catches the viewer.
IY: Don’t you also hint at some art-historic moments, other masters, with your choice of color palette, objects like sunflowers, and so on?
SC: I made many big paintings that almost feel like they have a hundred paintings in them. Part of that is due to the groups of objects and this is the recognition of the lowest form of art in an academic training, a still life. The individuality of the maker is what makes for an interesting result. I’m not looking for describing something as outrageous; quite the opposite, I’m playing with imagery that’s been around for centuries and I try to work in a way that makes them unmistakably mine.
IY: So what’s it with the chairs? And the keyholes?
SC: Like human beings, the chairs have arms, legs, and backs. They’re ordinariness, domesticity, things that were developed thousands of years ago and barely improved, a bit like umbrellas. On the other hand, keyhole is a motif I have been playing with for years. I think it’s a game every child plays. The person looking through the keyhole is usually looking at something that he or she is not supposed to be looking at. When I work in my studio, at the end of the day I lock the door and look through the keyhole to see what I’ve made that day. All I can see is what I’ve done; all else is edited out.
IY: And what about William Blake?
SC: He was seen as a bit of a patient, really. I’m interested in people like him that don’t belong anywhere, that are treated with suspicion… He did extraordinary things that are rather subversive, very relevant. Contrary by default. A kindred spirit. A great artist. And mentally ill by today’s standards.
IY: And lonely?
SC: If you’re an artist that makes work slowly and is dependent on a handwriting, you spend most of your adult life in solitary confinement…
IY: Is it therapeutic?
SC: I guess it’s a way of alleviating a tedium and there are various levels of catharsis in it; it’s like running away from home without leaving the room. I’m interested in journeys at many different levels.
IY: What’s next for you?
SC: The Venice show consisted of small paintings. I have a great fear of repeating myself. So I’m currently working on very large paintings based on the political moments of our time.
April 21 2018, Istanbul
Istanbul's art enthusiasts met Stephen Chambers' art, authentic, pleasant and equally ironic like himself, thanks to the exhibition "The Big Country and Other Stories" at the Pera Museum. Since then, the world has swiftly changed; the United Kingdom said "no" to the European Union. Wars and migrations turned the demographic data upside down. During his visit to Istanbul, had a colorful conversation with Chambers on his paintings addressing all these issues.
IY: What’s your purpose of visit to Istanbul this time?
SC: I did a show at the Pera Museum four years ago and met Baha (Toygar). The main exhibit was an enormous print, probably one the biggest edition prints ever made, and Baha has a copy, the 5th edition of 6, in his collection. From there we became friends and today is the first time I’m going to see it framed and installed at his apartment.
IY: “The Big Country and Other Stories”... That show centered around that piece, The Big Country, right?
SC: Yes. The piece has been shown quite widely and was originally made for an exhibition at the Royal Academy in London.
IY: Then you had this big exhibition as a collateral event of the 2017 Venice Biennale...
SC: That was a big gig that ran from May to November last year. It’s currently in Cambridge until the end of May. They are two cities that are used to having banks of portraits. In Venice you have the portraits of the leaders of the city everywhere and in Cambridge, those of the masters of the colleges going back hundreds of years. The exhibition consists of 101 imagined portraits of the Court of Redonda...
IY: It’s partly imaginary and partly based on reality. That’s what I like about your work... Mixing them on one plane, like life itself...
SC: It’s a curious one, because when people first read about Redonda, the initial reaction frequently is that it’s quite whimsical or light-hearted; but what intrigues me is the other side of that, i.e. the references to the world we now live in and the movements of people and multiculturalism. I come from a city where the whole world arrives, so it’s very diverse. I wanted to make a comment about how a society could be if you just put different people in charge of it...
IY: You have a lot of “what if” departure points...
SC: I often describe my works as “ignition points” for the beginnings of unconcluded narratives. I rarely tell people what happens in the end. I invite them to finish it themselves.
IY: You are actually a storyteller...
SC: I think I am. I used to try to avoid the word “narrative” as it is currently quite pejorative. Actually that’s what I am! I know that I embroid a conversation with anecdotes and I guess this is just how my brain works, almost to establish a setting. I go to the theatre all the time, more than I go to the cinema. I also love cinema but in theatre I like that improvisation within a square of space; you have to make the most out of those limited means.
IY: You also designed some theatre settings yourself…
SC: I worked with The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden some years ago. I made three sets for the Royal Ballet…
IY: Your compositions are like a theatre square anyway…
SC: That’s what a writer from Berlin told me as well! It’s probably quite true.
IY: Would it be accurate to say that your work originates from a variety of storytelling traditions? Hieroglyphs in one way, comics in another… Even Boccaccio’s Decameron or Chauser’s Canterbury Tales…
SC: I’m a reflection of my experiences like we all are. I think I like playing with other people’s ideas and I recognize a good idea when I hear it. The Court of Redonda, for instance, was really a type of unfamiliar collaboration with a Spanish writer, Javíer Marias. He have actually never met in person; we exchanged letters in the old-fashioned way...
IY: Your works also have a satirical attitude… They aren’t that “innocent”, it seems…
SC: I don’t think they’re innocent at all. I feel quite strongly about things but I also have a type of “English politeness”, which perhaps results in me saying something quite hard in a humorous way. It’s probably also related to the tradition of satire in Britain going back to the 17th, 18th centuries…
IY: You tackle some very heavy contemporary subjects like migration, war, social problems…
SC: I have increasingly become impatient and thus increasingly political in many ways. Right now, Britain is quite a confused and divided country because of the Brexit vote. In my view, it was the result of reckless political opportunism.
IY: And how about printmaking? Although you’re a painter, it’s apparently a big part of your oeuvre…
SC: Yes, you’re correct. I never did any printmaking when I was a student. I started doing it quite late but it became an important part of the way I think. The size and everything…
IY: “Size matters” in contemporary art…
SC: Actually the work at the Pera Museum has to do a lot with my frustration with the contemporary print, in that printmakers are often presented with a sense of inferiority or parochialness. I did the work to empower the world of the printmakers, both in terms of the scale and the process.
IY: This inferiority is so ironic, considering the supremacy of digital editions nowadays…
SC: I don’t mind what process is used as long as the result is interesting. For instance, I make my paintings all by myself but I make my prints with the assistance of very good printers who guide me through the complicated corridors...
IY: What’s your relationship to manual labor?
SC: I’m the grafter. The paintings I make are fantastically impractical.
IY: How do your drawings relate to your paintings and prints?
SC: There are moments when I just make images. They start off quite loose. They’re a way of thinking, of realizing an idea. There are big paintings I’m doing in the studio at the moment that are based on some drawings I made ten years ago. They’re very much a revisit…
IY: Then I assume you don’t approach your body of work in terms of “phases”…
SC: That’s a good question given what I’ve just said; but in some ways I think there are phases and that the work I have been making over the last few years has certainly been different. Instead of making one painting after another independently of each other, I have begun to work with ideas and bodies of work. To make my life harder I like to keep those works together, presented as one piece of work like in the “Court of Redonda”.
IY: How long did that take to finish?
SC: About fourteen months. Another moment of clinical insanity…
IY: I also notice a change in the aesthetic elements over time. Your earlier figures are neat, detailed and now they seem much more archaic to me…
SC: I think that’s probably right, something I’m playing with now. Figures are set somewhere in an unspecified past. If I make them overtly contemporary today, than they will be out of date tomorrow. In my view contemporary art deals with the past or other eras with far greater difficulty than literature or cinema does.
IY: Contemporary artworks are consumed so rapidly and viciously…
SC: I like slowing down the experience of seeing the work, of being with the work. I’m not adverse to an impact, though; in the Big Country, for instance, there’s a lace-like pattern that runs through the entire imagery. And I see this almost like a spider web that catches the viewer.
IY: Don’t you also hint at some art-historic moments, other masters, with your choice of color palette, objects like sunflowers, and so on?
SC: I made many big paintings that almost feel like they have a hundred paintings in them. Part of that is due to the groups of objects and this is the recognition of the lowest form of art in an academic training, a still life. The individuality of the maker is what makes for an interesting result. I’m not looking for describing something as outrageous; quite the opposite, I’m playing with imagery that’s been around for centuries and I try to work in a way that makes them unmistakably mine.
IY: So what’s it with the chairs? And the keyholes?
SC: Like human beings, the chairs have arms, legs, and backs. They’re ordinariness, domesticity, things that were developed thousands of years ago and barely improved, a bit like umbrellas. On the other hand, keyhole is a motif I have been playing with for years. I think it’s a game every child plays. The person looking through the keyhole is usually looking at something that he or she is not supposed to be looking at. When I work in my studio, at the end of the day I lock the door and look through the keyhole to see what I’ve made that day. All I can see is what I’ve done; all else is edited out.
IY: And what about William Blake?
SC: He was seen as a bit of a patient, really. I’m interested in people like him that don’t belong anywhere, that are treated with suspicion… He did extraordinary things that are rather subversive, very relevant. Contrary by default. A kindred spirit. A great artist. And mentally ill by today’s standards.
IY: And lonely?
SC: If you’re an artist that makes work slowly and is dependent on a handwriting, you spend most of your adult life in solitary confinement…
IY: Is it therapeutic?
SC: I guess it’s a way of alleviating a tedium and there are various levels of catharsis in it; it’s like running away from home without leaving the room. I’m interested in journeys at many different levels.
IY: What’s next for you?
SC: The Venice show consisted of small paintings. I have a great fear of repeating myself. So I’m currently working on very large paintings based on the political moments of our time.