Tell me about your creative process, how do you go from a commission, to design, to painting?
I’m always coming up with new ideas and I’ve learnt that the initial prep work for my pictures is such a crucial part of my process. I’ve found that the more energy I put into that stage, the more successful (and easier) the painting will be. My process is always the same but varies depending on how complex the piece is and it’s probably easiest to describe it by using one of my paintings as an example:
I recently finished a commission that showed the opening night of Peter Pan in 1904, it was painted on a huge canvas and showed a theatre packed with people and hundreds of tiny details. The whole thing was a little daunting but my first step is always to scribble down quick ideas. I usually have a clear vision of how a painting will look from the very start but these drawings help to show what I’ll need to do for prep. The next step is to begin building props and sets or finding locations. In the case of the Peter Pan piece, we contacted a local theatre who gave us full access for a whole day, which was incredible. I built a few props; a cardboard cannon, costumes for the lost boys, Captain Hooks hook and parts of a pirate ship to go on the stage. Every element of my paintings is always entirely staged and I use my friends and family as models, so at this point I start to find people who would like to be in the scene. For this piece I used almost my entire family (I have a lot of nieces and nephews who were perfect for the Lost Boys!)
On the day of the shoot, I loaded a van and headed over to the theatre with Adam, a brilliant photographer that I work with on all my paintings. We always arrive early, in this case about 5 hours before the models start to turn up, to set up the lighting and arrange the set. I like to have everything ready to go so that when people arrive, we can get the shoot done as quickly as possible. I use those original sketches as a guide to show people where I want them to stand and what I want them to do… Adam is like my creative consultant on each shoot and always helps me with the composition but also takes care of the technical side, which means I can focus all my energy on directing the models. Then I run around and take hundreds of photos. There’s always room for improvisation and to try different poses but overall it stays the same as I originally drew it at the beginning. It’s sometimes super stressful but always loads of fun.
In contrast to this, for another painting, I had my brother in law pose as a travelling salesman, I asked him to pretend to be asleep in an elevator and we shot the whole thing in my studio and it took about an hour… and that was it! But I got everything I needed which is always the goal.
After the shoot is done I go away and take the best elements from each image and combine them into one compositional sketch. I’ll transfer this sketch to the canvas using either the grid method, my projector, or freehand – it all depends on the complexity of the piece – and then, finally, I start painting!
The painting stage is probably harder to describe because there is still an element of ‘working it out as I go’ and I never start a picture thinking that I know what I’m doing…but in a nutshell, I usually start at the back and work forward and always work from dark to light but leave the very darkest and the lightest points for last. I work alla prima rather than in layers, using a limited palette of just 5 colours – and I try to complete each section before moving on to the next. And then I just jump in and hope for the best!