Oxford Brookes

An interview with Oli Wortley:

What’s your contribution towards organising the degree show?

I’ve suggested an artist who lectured at my previous university, (I transferred here at the beginning of my second year) to be guest speaker at our degree show opening. I’m also on the design team, putting together the degree show catalogue.

What are you currently working on?

I’ve been working on one project with various materials – printmaking, photography, drawing, sound and text. I want people to be in awe of the earth as a physical being, as mother of everything. Whereas icon painters painted religious figures, this seems misguided and these aren’t real. The earth is real – not god. Earth is god.

I want to explore how human beings relate to the earth as a thing, our relationship to the earth. There’s a verse in the Bible that says “remember man you are but dust, and unto dust you shall return”. Reminding people we’re not immortal, they’re going to be stardust again. This year I travelled to strange landscapes of Andorra and Iceland. Iceland is the quirky face of the earth. It’s the youngest place on earth. You can physically see land, earth, being made there.I realised there’s a theme recurring throughout my work, the mountain shape. And I’ve been developing the Mountain/Sun emblem as a symbol in my work. Hopefully it will be a symbol that will bring the whole work together.

What are your ideas for future work?

I want to make a film as a finalised work, with samples of the surrounding work on exhibition. The film is to reflect human beings’ destruction of the planet and suggest the connection to our actions.

Are there any difficulties you’ve come across?

Letting go of the photographs has been difficult, not getting attached to the images. Realising that I can’t make something as beautiful as the earth, can’t challenge the earth’s beauty. I can’t make something more beautiful than that.

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Interviewi with Susie Burningham

What is your role in the preparation for the Degree Show?

I’m a secretary with Kerri and I’m also at the web design team.

What are the current themes/concepts in your work?

Ok…That’s a hard one. So, imagining the somewhere else and trying to interpret an imaginary place within a framework of time and space. I am also interested in displacement and dislocation and taking yourself outside of yourself.

What mediums do you use?

I mainly draw and use charcoal and graphite, I also do oil painting.

How do these materials help you to develop your ideas?

Oil paint is really important because it gives you a great spectrum of colours and textures. I like to play with textures.

Is drawing a subconscious process in your work?

Yes I am quite free in the way that I draw.

Artists that inspire you?

Kathy Prendergast, she maps unconventional things, like she can map a hand… She interprets space and time in a new way. And Graham Gussin, he expresses our desire to be somewhere else.

What inspires you most?

Light and texture I’d say are the main things.

Do you dream about the places that you paint?

Yes sometimes, they are mainly day dreams…if I’m on the bus or train.

How are you planning to further develop your artistic practice?

I want to go really really large scale. To give my paintings a bit of an overwhelming presence. Which will heighten the sense of displacement. so that it feels like you are somewhere else when you are in-front of it.

What format do you like to use? I like to work with unusual canvas shapes, like circle, oval or really long and narrow.

Do you think a use of unorthodox formats in your landscape paintings helps you to immerse the viewer?

Yes I think it helps, I don’t think the standard format is necessary the natural way of looking. I think rectangles are used too much.

What was your main difficulty this term?

Probably time. Oil painting is very time consuming, so time management. And also…I don’t know how to explain it..when you have loads of ideas you have to pick up a couple, you can’t do everything.

Any other difficulties?

I don’t think so. (Laughing).

What was the successful part of this term?

Umm….successes….. I think that is harder than difficulties. Working with scientific apparatus was quite successful. I’ve never done that before and it was really exciting. What did you use it for? I used the scientific imagery to give my fictional landscapes a sense of reality. I added those images to my landscapes. What were the images of? Astrolabes. Always forget the names because they are too scientific for me..(laughing). Quadrants. Astrolabes mainly. It’s an apparatus that measures the outer space, the solar system.

Interviewed by Mariya Zherdeva

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