Wednesday, January 28, 2015

Introducing... Phill Hopkins


Exhibition curator Si Smith chats with artist Phill Hopkins about soft landings,unexpected positivity, and the word 'lamentation'.


Si: Hi Phill, can you tell us a bit about yourself?

Phill: Hello. I grew up on a large postwar council estate in south Bristol. In the early 1980’s I studied fine art/sculpture at Goldsmiths college in London, where I was taught by Michael Craig Martin, Richard Wentworth and Carl Plackman. After that I moved to Leeds where I’ve lived ever since. 
I work in a studio at home. I find it very easy to work at home, it’s a very smooth transition directly into the work that comes from a quieter and more centered space.

Si: That studio of yours is a glorious place, I get the feeling that a sense of place to create in is quite important to you and your work.



Phill: My studio space is very important. It is the place where I am able to strip everything down. I have grown very attached to my cabin space. Although the subject matter that I work with is very much urban, I do appreciate the quietness of working alongside my garden, the bird song, the sounds of different weather, the plants and wildlife that come in and out.
 
Perhaps I need a calm place so that the frenetic contents of my head can find a soft place to land. 




At the moment I can hear a jackdaw squawking over a Britten piece I’m listening to. 
I like to work alongside music. As my work has really got hold of a repeated image, I have become more contemplative and the music I choose to accompany me allows this or fosters this.

Si: The Stations of the Cross exhibition at St Edmund's won't be the first time that you've made and shown work in a church. Can you tell us a bit about your 'Easter (Gas Variations)' piece?

Phill: I have taken many photographs in central Leeds of the pieces of cardboard left after being used to sit on by people who ask passers-by for spare change. These pieces that are carefully selected and placed resonate with my own use of cardboard as a material for making drawings on and with.

The cardboard used in my piece here had previously been laid in the central aisle at St George’s Church. Many hundreds of people have trodden on it and unknowingly participated in the piece.

In the context of the church the cardboard is certainly not gold, frankincense or myrrh, it is worthless, but the people who beg and use it as insulation from the cold imbue it with value. The piece is the net of a box. It is flattened, opened, exposed, deconstructed or yet to be made-up.




Si: I love that people were unwittingly contributing to the piece all the while. In many ways it's an unusual artwork to find hanging in a church - how did people respond to it?

Phill: I was surprised at how positive people were. It was a very large piece, 5m high, and I was expecting a bit of bother. 

Si: Thinking ahead to the ‘Stations’ show at St Ed’s, I'm interested to find out what attracted you to the exhibition - why you're keen to be a part of it, and to maybe get a little insight into what you'll be making for the show...

Phill: I like these kind of exhibitions. Showing in a church is very different from showing in a gallery. Things can be thrown off kilter very easily. The work is often stripped bare by the environment and sits in a very vulnerable position; I like that. 


I'm not sure what my piece will be like. It will be made quickly, after a lot of thinking and turning ideas over in my mind. I like the word 'lamentation' and the work will be centred on that. 


You can find Phill online here 
 
And on Facebook here 

Wednesday, January 21, 2015

The Stations of the Cross at St. Edmunds.



“…When Christians visited the Holy Land they would follow Christ’s itinerary from Maundy Thursday to Holy Saturday, visiting the Holy sites, walking the Via Crucis (Way of the Cross) and praying at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, built on the place where Christ was buried. Those who could not make the journey could nonetheless share the pilgrimage experience and live through Christ’s final hours empathetically in the Stations of the Cross, a medieval devotion which comprises fourteen images representing the different events of the Passion, from the sentencing of Christ to his burial, before which prayers and petitions are made…”
Gabriele Finaldi, from ‘The Image of Christ’ (the National Gallery, 2000)

THE STATIONS OF THE CROSS will be an exhibition at St. Edmund's Church in Roundhay, featuring the work of fourteen Leeds-based artists, each of whom have been invited to create work in response to a moment in Christ's journey to the cross.


On this blog we'll be hoping to post regular updates about how plans for the show are progressing, information about the contributing artists, and possibly some previews of the work being created for the exhibition...