Nathan Murphy (August 2012)
Nathan Murphy, Throughout zc, dimensions variable, painted steel, 2012 (Photograph: Damian Griffiths)
Nathan Murphy, Throughout zc, (Doorway piece, the second piece of the installation), dimensions variable, painted steel, 2012 (Photograph: Damian Griffiths)
A Submersible: I understand you see yourself as a sculptor despite the fact that you do a lot of installation work. Could you say a bit about this?
Nathan Murphy: It's just some sort of romantic notion I've had in my head from when I started with art. I think my first influence in terms of art and sculpture was Henry Moore. So when I first began...I was probably doing my GCSE's. I was so interested in natural forms and carving, I completely idolised Henry Moore. Because of that, because I loved him so much I did my BA in Leeds as that was where he was from. The campus used to be based in the Yorkshire Sculpture Park and I loved it there too. So that's how I began, just through my love of Henry Moore.
And it was just through research and development, saying I like this, but wondering what other forms of art I could do or pursue. The person who shifted my thinking from Henry Moore was Anthony Caro. He's the one that transformed my sculptural language. Because I was so...at one time I was so pro-nature and natural form that I couldn't see anything else. And then all of sudden it was almost like one day I saw this and thought I'm going to try this, and then I started it and I couldn't stop. I just loved geometric structures and playing with architectural language if you know what I mean. So it completely transformed it.
And I remember I always used to love making maquettes and models. I used to make 100's out of card, wood and plastic, just using anything. I remember when I was in Leeds, I was just bending pieces of acrylic plastic by heating it under a toaster. Just because I wanted to make a little model because I was so fascinated with how to...
Another reason why I think I'm a sculptor is the fact that I'm so fascinated by different materials. So it's almost like I just love doing different things and with different materials. And obviously if it will lead me on to something I'll carry it on. So you know I started off carving polystyrene and ended up welding arched steel.
I do see it as sculptural because it is actually just treating materials and knowing how to use them. And there is some sort of connection with me being a chef. If you think of it in its simplest terms, food is just another material. You've just got to treat it and know how to use it and then you can get the optimum result.
And it's exactly the same. If you want to be an artist or in my respect I'd like to be sculptor, you've just got know...I wouldn't say quite the science, but kind of in a way. You've just got to know how it will work and all these different possibilities that you can have with it by treating it in various different ways. So there is that sort of weird parallel with sculpture.
A S: So I gather Wimboldon College of Art had a good reputation for sculpture in the late 70's and 80's?
N M: Yes, around that time. The big colleges were like obviously the RCA, Wimboldon, St Martin’s and the Slade, they've always been big ones.
Wimboldon at this time, it was big on sculpture and that kind of influenced my decision to go there. But it's also the placement of the college as well. It's not quite central London, it's in the South West, right down in a leafy suburb. And I'm from Wales, so the South Coast. I did go to Leeds and I was in the city, but I kind of like it a bit quieter.
And even where I'm based now, I'm in South West London, Sreatham Hill just down from Brixton. I'm still kind of out of the way, I don't feel like I'm right in the centre of London, it's too chaotic, I don't want that.
A S: Just looking at the works that you've got on your website, are they still relevant to you or have you moved on? Do they still characterise your practice to an extent or...
N M: It's kind of moved away from being like objects. I think I have moved because I've gone into the installation territory. Dealing directly with a particular space whereas before I was dealing with an object that fitted in the space. So it has changed because it is completely made for one space it could not work anywhere else. It would have to be rebuilt, redesigned, everything for a different space every time.
Nathan Murphy, Throughout, dimensions variable, painted steel, 2011 (Photograph: Nathan Murphy)
Nathan Murphy, Throughout, dimensions variable, painted steel, 2011 (Photograph: Nathan Murphy)
Nathan Murphy, Throughout, dimensions variable, painted steel, 2011 (Photograph: Nathan Murphy)
Nathan Murphy, Throughout, dimensions variable, painted steel, 2011 (Photograph: Nathan Murphy)
A S: So can you say a bit about the relationship between Throughout and Throughout zc?
N M: I was approached to do the Zabludowicz exhibition based on Throughout, so that's why I continued in that vain. So that's why it's so similar because it is just a development of that but in a different space. So in some respects it's the same work because it's just been worked into a different space.
Nathan Murphy; Necker construction; 243cm x 121cm x 182cm; sheet steel, sheet wood, steel rods; 2011,
(Photograph: Nathan Murphy)
(Photograph: Nathan Murphy)
Nathan Murphy; Necker construction; 243cm x 121cm x 182cm; sheet steel, sheet wood, steel rods; 2011,
(Photograph: Nathan Murphy)
(Photograph: Nathan Murphy)
A S: Compared to Throughout and Throughout zc, in Necker construction is there a different way in which you're engaging with the space? Necker Construction seems to be...it brings the focus more to itself as opposed to the space compared to Throughout perhaps?
N M: Yes that's interesting actually. It used to be more object based where it was almost the traditional sense of what a sculpture was in modernist times. Where it was built just to be sculptural structure.
Whereas the Throughout pieces are more concerned with actually how they operate in the space and you engage with a particular part of a space whereas the previous works were there for you to just walk around and engage with. With the Throughout pieces, you almost don't have a choice, you have to engage with it. Because they're positioned in such a way that you have to go through them, you have to experience that space.
A S: Were you playing with those ideas in a sense in Necker Construction too? Because the way the yellow line is directly on the floor and how the rods appear...I mean this is coming from an outside perspective and maybe you disagree, but they seem to be on the way to doing what the throughout pieces are doing?
N M: Well I mean when I made it, it must have been like March or April 2011. It kind of shifted my thinking. I was having discussions with people. I think I was trying harder to get more connection with the space and the thing I was thinking, in Necker Construction, the only connection it really had architecturally with the space was gravity maybe. It didn't really tie in with the space. I mean I still liked them, I still love those pieces. But they need...they weren't doing what I wanted them to do if you know that I mean.
A S: What did you think of the Throughout pieces when you'd done them? What kind of experience was that for you?
N M: Well that was great. Because...it's very strange when you make it and then you actually walk through it yourself. But how do I describe it...
They're almost, they're there but almost invisible. So it's kind of like using space, giving you an experience of a space that kind of isn't there. So I'm sort of emphasising...I guess I didn't want it to be so physically imposing. I just wanted to give you an understanding that I've given you this space to encounter. And I was trying to be as subtle as I could with it. So that’s why...I was was literally trying to make them just like lines in space, that you just walk through.
I wanted them almost to be nothing but when you encounter them they're quite physically imposing. Although they're just these linear structures and you walk through them you get the feeling that they're these big structures it's quite a bizarre feeling.
A S: Yeh you really do, at least I found that. The one in the doorway at the Zabludowicz Collection especially.
N M: What I needed to develop and what I still do was the movement in them. It was deliberate that they were constructed in a certain way. When you shook them they really moved. I don't know. When you when you were in the Zabludowicz space did you give them a little shake?
A S: No, I was the typical kind of petrified viewer tentatively stepping over it.
N M: This is the thing, sometimes you don't how people will engage with it other than just the way I'm thinking you know. Some people were just going for it, they were really shaking it. And that was my intention because they were solid steel, it's not going anywhere.
The ones in throughout they also had that, they all moved. It was kind of...what's the word? I don't know, you sort of created an atmosphere when you did it in them. You didn't know if they were going to topple or not. I knew they wouldn't because I constructed them. I worked out the tensions in the steel and things, so I knew they weren't going to topple or break or collapse.
A S: So this idea of the way we experience space, is this still important for you?
N M: Yeh that's still my main focus. That's why I want to experiment with different medias or using some of my skills and incorporating them with other people's skills. Because I mean at the moment the experience of space, the one I'm creating currently is just a physicality whereas I mean there's different senses which could be explored that for me could completely transform it. Like sound. So sight and the imposing physical nature are the two things I guess which are there at the moment. But sound and maybe changing it so it's an illusion of it. Rather than just being a physical illusion that I sort of create with the lines. I could do that by projecting it or I could...I don’t know there are other avenues, they’re different ways I could sort of explore it. That's why I sort of want to experiment and carry it on and see how far I could push it really.
A S: Maybe with reference to the Throughout pieces or perhaps anything you're thinking of at the moment, I was interested in how in a sense they are insubstantial. So you're not taken away from the space. You're made more aware of it if anything.
On the one hand, it could be seen as performing a highlighting function, highlighting or outlining to change the awareness of your surroundings. But in another sense creating a new space, for example with the through pieces there's a new shape there, there's a new space created in that sense.
N M: Yeh I think those two factors are relevant and they're things that are in those pieces definitely. I do want to highlight new spaces but also yes I want to show a space and different aspects of a space.
A S: And when you're making these works, is it more focussed on yourself? Or are you imagining a viewer and how they'll react in the space and what you'll bring about in them?
N M: I'd like to say I'm considering the potential viewer. But obviously me making it I'm sort of building it in the space. I'm changing it and moving it around. I am using myself as a guide when I'm doing it so it is kind of based on me. But I'm trying to think how it may operate for other people.
A S: The way these works are so linear, do you see see connections to things like drawing and the play between 2D and 3D?
N M: That's something I have been interested in for a while. I used to create these structures that did that very same thing. Even in the Necker construction piece this is evident. If you look at it from two angles it's solid and then it's linear planes. That was the reason for me choosing that and obviously the rods. That kind of led onto it. I'm interested in that kind of dialogue between 2D and 3D space. I think it's interesting how things operate in space just on a visual level. That's something I always consider. These particular pieces, they were based just on a level of being linear drawings in a way I guess.
A S: So say when you have said things like how your work “engages” in a certain way with space, these statements strike me as quite tricky in a sense. Because in a way what they’re doing is literally just describing what is happening. So you could actually be doing anything you want and just describe it, but that doesn’t necessarily suggest it’s got any value...
N M: I think the thing with my work is it’s quite performative in a way. So it’s not just like looking at something like a painting, when you have that immediate effect just from viewing it. You literally have to be involved with the work in order to get something from it. You have to engage with the actual physical space. I’m describing it but it is that union of the work and the viewer. That’s intrinsic to how the work works. It might seem just like it’s just a description, but to me it makes a lot of sense. Maybe I’m not as articulate in describing it as I should be in describing it I don’t know.
A S: Well no I think you talk really clearly about your work personally, I think it’s just the nature of what you’re describing perhaps. And so with your interest in space, are you just interested in it as you might be interested in line or colour. So do you see space as another element?
N M: I think sometimes it really can be that simple. It’s part of the medium in a way, it all interlinks together you know. I mean I’m kind of highlighting the space as well as the sculpture, it’s all together...there’s something there that combines the two together. One doesn’t dominate the other, they’re in tandem.
A S: Thinking about your Throughout pieces first. For me these works relate to invisible aspects of our experience, and they do so in three ways. Firstly, like you have said, when they are shaken they create an atmosphere, something which is of course invisible.
As for how this happens, I see your structures not as isolated objects, but as structures that are involved with the surrounding space, given their potential for movement. And via shaking the works, the viewer is involved with the space via the work. The works occupy one point in space then another, then another and so on. So through the visible shaking the surrounding invisible space then becomes part of the work, which then provides this atmospheric sense. And a second thing is how they have this physically imposing quality.
N M: Yeh and which again doesn’t seem to make sense until you’re actually in it and if you make that movement. Because you almost feel like there’s a large structure above you whereas they’re just lines in space otherwise. But they do actually feel quite architectural and quite physical when you move them.
A S: Yeh you sort of get a feeling something really heavy is going to fall on you. And then a third way in which the Throughout pieces perhaps relate to invisibility is how there is this demarcation of space you have talked about. So the previously invisible shape in space is highlighted. So it seems that invisibility is present in at least three different ways in these works. Is this an underlying interest you have?
N M: Well yeh, it’s interesting but it’s something I’ve been meaning to delve deeper into. Whether it’s some sort of unconscious thing that’s sort of driving me to do this. Something that...almost it’s not tangible...but it is. Again it’s one of these really difficult things to explain. I’m just fascinated by something that can be so big but almost not exist. I don’t know how to explain it other than that really.
A S: Yeh I love that kind of thing in art. For me something which is invisible feels exciting, because it's somehow less controllable, harder to get a handle on...and perhaps that explains the draw of these works a bit. Do you agree from your perspective?
N M: Yeh I’d kind of go along with that. The way I make my work, it’s fairly intuitive. In some ways obviously I’m drawing on other works I’ve done; I do analyze works. I mean there must be some parts to it which are deep within my head unconsciously that come out out into it, which is quite interesting. I love this intuitive nature to work. When I used to make loads of mockettes, I just didn’t think, I’d just smash them all out. Just let your mind and your hands do it without the control. So you don’t think in your head it’s just kind of happening. But there is a structure to it obviously when I’m working it out. But the process obviously takes priority. Maybe some part of it is just coming from another point of my brain that I can’t clearly define, if that makes any sense!
A S: Yeh definitely. Earlier on you said that you think your work’s quite performative. Is there anything you’d like to say about that...
N M: Well only in that it needs that participation from the viewer in order for it to work. It needs that or it renders is useless almost. Without the body or the eyes to experience it then it’s meaningless, If it does have any meaning if you know what I mean.
A S: Is there anything you’d like to talk about?
N M: Well the actual process of the work in terms of the material is something that’s quite important to me in my work.
A S: Oh great, if you could talk a little about that....
N M: There’s this kind of intuitive nature to me but it’s also quite structured in a way. I mean it has to be because of the forms I’m using. I’m using the existing architecture of certain places and spaces, so I have to do that. But yeh process is important. I’ve learned a lot of processes. I mean I used to use clay when I started and I used to use fibreglass. And it’s kind of it’s like a little journey that sort of led me on to all these different materials in this quest to sort of strip things down and make things as invisible as possible. And it’s quite strange the fact that it’s led me on to steel and welding. I didn’t think when starting and I was carving wood forms that I’d end up welding pieces of steel together.
I love different materials, I just love making things, I always have done. And one thing’s just led on to another. I’m not sure if there’s anything I can really express in it other than the fact I’m just using lots of different materials, and that process is very important to my work.
A S: So when you say process, so say you work with clay, there are certain techniques that you’ve got to learn. So is that what you mean by process?
N M: Yeh the specific skill that you need in order to correctly and professionally produce things. I like to be able to do them well. I like to really learn the process as well before I do them. I get really interested in it, I really delve into it.
Obviously you get artists who don’t do these things themselves. But for me, I always have to make my own work. I feel that I have to actually physically make it myself. I feel that I lose any ownership of the work if I don’t do that. Part of the skill in making it that’s part of the artwork for me.
A S: So as we were talking about before, you could say you’re creating an experience in a way perhaps. And in this sense the making of it maybe isn’t so key to the viewer’s experience. Because you’re making this system where one thing is the viewer, the other thing is the light, the other is material etc. Now maybe you don’t see it like this, but with a more traditional sculpture there’s more emphasis on the viewer looking at the physical thing looking at how this thing was made perhaps. Do you find there’s a tension there? Because you’re doing this installation work then the making of it isn’t so key in the viewer’s experience perhaps?
N M: Well it’s not so key for the viewer’s experience, but for me it is. It’s just the pleasure of making it that’s just part of it for me really.
A S: You know how you were saying how one material leads you onto the next. Is it something in the process itself which leads you on or....
N M: Well there’s always an interest, I always want to try something else, even if it’s not working for what I’m going to do. But the decisions made for these steel pieces for instance were influenced by what it needs to do, so it needed to be the strongest, but at the same time to be the least seen and then also still give me rigidity, so it has to do all these things I’m trying to do. So it’s just trying to work out what’s going to be best, and in order to do this I need to learn these processes, which is fun in itself for me.
A S: You know you were saying how you work quite intuitively but like you were saying it has to be planned at the same time....
N M: Well it is planned to a certain degree but I mean the plan kind of is in my head. When I was in these spaces I used to just document them and literally just spend a couple of days in them without really doing anything just to be in the space you know. Obviously I have to do measurements and work it out. But I’ll be in there and I’ll just be looking around and it will just kind of work and I can just see it. I think I just make basic general measurements based on the space that I can see because I can already see it.
Links:
www.axisweb.org/seCVPG.aspx?ArtistID=16132
Interview conducted live online, (August 2012)
N M: Yes that's interesting actually. It used to be more object based where it was almost the traditional sense of what a sculpture was in modernist times. Where it was built just to be sculptural structure.
Whereas the Throughout pieces are more concerned with actually how they operate in the space and you engage with a particular part of a space whereas the previous works were there for you to just walk around and engage with. With the Throughout pieces, you almost don't have a choice, you have to engage with it. Because they're positioned in such a way that you have to go through them, you have to experience that space.
A S: Were you playing with those ideas in a sense in Necker Construction too? Because the way the yellow line is directly on the floor and how the rods appear...I mean this is coming from an outside perspective and maybe you disagree, but they seem to be on the way to doing what the throughout pieces are doing?
N M: Well I mean when I made it, it must have been like March or April 2011. It kind of shifted my thinking. I was having discussions with people. I think I was trying harder to get more connection with the space and the thing I was thinking, in Necker Construction, the only connection it really had architecturally with the space was gravity maybe. It didn't really tie in with the space. I mean I still liked them, I still love those pieces. But they need...they weren't doing what I wanted them to do if you know that I mean.
A S: What did you think of the Throughout pieces when you'd done them? What kind of experience was that for you?
N M: Well that was great. Because...it's very strange when you make it and then you actually walk through it yourself. But how do I describe it...
They're almost, they're there but almost invisible. So it's kind of like using space, giving you an experience of a space that kind of isn't there. So I'm sort of emphasising...I guess I didn't want it to be so physically imposing. I just wanted to give you an understanding that I've given you this space to encounter. And I was trying to be as subtle as I could with it. So that’s why...I was was literally trying to make them just like lines in space, that you just walk through.
I wanted them almost to be nothing but when you encounter them they're quite physically imposing. Although they're just these linear structures and you walk through them you get the feeling that they're these big structures it's quite a bizarre feeling.
A S: Yeh you really do, at least I found that. The one in the doorway at the Zabludowicz Collection especially.
N M: What I needed to develop and what I still do was the movement in them. It was deliberate that they were constructed in a certain way. When you shook them they really moved. I don't know. When you when you were in the Zabludowicz space did you give them a little shake?
A S: No, I was the typical kind of petrified viewer tentatively stepping over it.
N M: This is the thing, sometimes you don't how people will engage with it other than just the way I'm thinking you know. Some people were just going for it, they were really shaking it. And that was my intention because they were solid steel, it's not going anywhere.
The ones in throughout they also had that, they all moved. It was kind of...what's the word? I don't know, you sort of created an atmosphere when you did it in them. You didn't know if they were going to topple or not. I knew they wouldn't because I constructed them. I worked out the tensions in the steel and things, so I knew they weren't going to topple or break or collapse.
A S: So this idea of the way we experience space, is this still important for you?
N M: Yeh that's still my main focus. That's why I want to experiment with different medias or using some of my skills and incorporating them with other people's skills. Because I mean at the moment the experience of space, the one I'm creating currently is just a physicality whereas I mean there's different senses which could be explored that for me could completely transform it. Like sound. So sight and the imposing physical nature are the two things I guess which are there at the moment. But sound and maybe changing it so it's an illusion of it. Rather than just being a physical illusion that I sort of create with the lines. I could do that by projecting it or I could...I don’t know there are other avenues, they’re different ways I could sort of explore it. That's why I sort of want to experiment and carry it on and see how far I could push it really.
A S: Maybe with reference to the Throughout pieces or perhaps anything you're thinking of at the moment, I was interested in how in a sense they are insubstantial. So you're not taken away from the space. You're made more aware of it if anything.
On the one hand, it could be seen as performing a highlighting function, highlighting or outlining to change the awareness of your surroundings. But in another sense creating a new space, for example with the through pieces there's a new shape there, there's a new space created in that sense.
N M: Yeh I think those two factors are relevant and they're things that are in those pieces definitely. I do want to highlight new spaces but also yes I want to show a space and different aspects of a space.
A S: And when you're making these works, is it more focussed on yourself? Or are you imagining a viewer and how they'll react in the space and what you'll bring about in them?
N M: I'd like to say I'm considering the potential viewer. But obviously me making it I'm sort of building it in the space. I'm changing it and moving it around. I am using myself as a guide when I'm doing it so it is kind of based on me. But I'm trying to think how it may operate for other people.
A S: The way these works are so linear, do you see see connections to things like drawing and the play between 2D and 3D?
N M: That's something I have been interested in for a while. I used to create these structures that did that very same thing. Even in the Necker construction piece this is evident. If you look at it from two angles it's solid and then it's linear planes. That was the reason for me choosing that and obviously the rods. That kind of led onto it. I'm interested in that kind of dialogue between 2D and 3D space. I think it's interesting how things operate in space just on a visual level. That's something I always consider. These particular pieces, they were based just on a level of being linear drawings in a way I guess.
A S: So say when you have said things like how your work “engages” in a certain way with space, these statements strike me as quite tricky in a sense. Because in a way what they’re doing is literally just describing what is happening. So you could actually be doing anything you want and just describe it, but that doesn’t necessarily suggest it’s got any value...
N M: I think the thing with my work is it’s quite performative in a way. So it’s not just like looking at something like a painting, when you have that immediate effect just from viewing it. You literally have to be involved with the work in order to get something from it. You have to engage with the actual physical space. I’m describing it but it is that union of the work and the viewer. That’s intrinsic to how the work works. It might seem just like it’s just a description, but to me it makes a lot of sense. Maybe I’m not as articulate in describing it as I should be in describing it I don’t know.
A S: Well no I think you talk really clearly about your work personally, I think it’s just the nature of what you’re describing perhaps. And so with your interest in space, are you just interested in it as you might be interested in line or colour. So do you see space as another element?
N M: I think sometimes it really can be that simple. It’s part of the medium in a way, it all interlinks together you know. I mean I’m kind of highlighting the space as well as the sculpture, it’s all together...there’s something there that combines the two together. One doesn’t dominate the other, they’re in tandem.
A S: Thinking about your Throughout pieces first. For me these works relate to invisible aspects of our experience, and they do so in three ways. Firstly, like you have said, when they are shaken they create an atmosphere, something which is of course invisible.
As for how this happens, I see your structures not as isolated objects, but as structures that are involved with the surrounding space, given their potential for movement. And via shaking the works, the viewer is involved with the space via the work. The works occupy one point in space then another, then another and so on. So through the visible shaking the surrounding invisible space then becomes part of the work, which then provides this atmospheric sense. And a second thing is how they have this physically imposing quality.
N M: Yeh and which again doesn’t seem to make sense until you’re actually in it and if you make that movement. Because you almost feel like there’s a large structure above you whereas they’re just lines in space otherwise. But they do actually feel quite architectural and quite physical when you move them.
A S: Yeh you sort of get a feeling something really heavy is going to fall on you. And then a third way in which the Throughout pieces perhaps relate to invisibility is how there is this demarcation of space you have talked about. So the previously invisible shape in space is highlighted. So it seems that invisibility is present in at least three different ways in these works. Is this an underlying interest you have?
N M: Well yeh, it’s interesting but it’s something I’ve been meaning to delve deeper into. Whether it’s some sort of unconscious thing that’s sort of driving me to do this. Something that...almost it’s not tangible...but it is. Again it’s one of these really difficult things to explain. I’m just fascinated by something that can be so big but almost not exist. I don’t know how to explain it other than that really.
A S: Yeh I love that kind of thing in art. For me something which is invisible feels exciting, because it's somehow less controllable, harder to get a handle on...and perhaps that explains the draw of these works a bit. Do you agree from your perspective?
N M: Yeh I’d kind of go along with that. The way I make my work, it’s fairly intuitive. In some ways obviously I’m drawing on other works I’ve done; I do analyze works. I mean there must be some parts to it which are deep within my head unconsciously that come out out into it, which is quite interesting. I love this intuitive nature to work. When I used to make loads of mockettes, I just didn’t think, I’d just smash them all out. Just let your mind and your hands do it without the control. So you don’t think in your head it’s just kind of happening. But there is a structure to it obviously when I’m working it out. But the process obviously takes priority. Maybe some part of it is just coming from another point of my brain that I can’t clearly define, if that makes any sense!
A S: Yeh definitely. Earlier on you said that you think your work’s quite performative. Is there anything you’d like to say about that...
N M: Well only in that it needs that participation from the viewer in order for it to work. It needs that or it renders is useless almost. Without the body or the eyes to experience it then it’s meaningless, If it does have any meaning if you know what I mean.
A S: Is there anything you’d like to talk about?
N M: Well the actual process of the work in terms of the material is something that’s quite important to me in my work.
A S: Oh great, if you could talk a little about that....
N M: There’s this kind of intuitive nature to me but it’s also quite structured in a way. I mean it has to be because of the forms I’m using. I’m using the existing architecture of certain places and spaces, so I have to do that. But yeh process is important. I’ve learned a lot of processes. I mean I used to use clay when I started and I used to use fibreglass. And it’s kind of it’s like a little journey that sort of led me on to all these different materials in this quest to sort of strip things down and make things as invisible as possible. And it’s quite strange the fact that it’s led me on to steel and welding. I didn’t think when starting and I was carving wood forms that I’d end up welding pieces of steel together.
I love different materials, I just love making things, I always have done. And one thing’s just led on to another. I’m not sure if there’s anything I can really express in it other than the fact I’m just using lots of different materials, and that process is very important to my work.
A S: So when you say process, so say you work with clay, there are certain techniques that you’ve got to learn. So is that what you mean by process?
N M: Yeh the specific skill that you need in order to correctly and professionally produce things. I like to be able to do them well. I like to really learn the process as well before I do them. I get really interested in it, I really delve into it.
Obviously you get artists who don’t do these things themselves. But for me, I always have to make my own work. I feel that I have to actually physically make it myself. I feel that I lose any ownership of the work if I don’t do that. Part of the skill in making it that’s part of the artwork for me.
A S: So as we were talking about before, you could say you’re creating an experience in a way perhaps. And in this sense the making of it maybe isn’t so key to the viewer’s experience. Because you’re making this system where one thing is the viewer, the other thing is the light, the other is material etc. Now maybe you don’t see it like this, but with a more traditional sculpture there’s more emphasis on the viewer looking at the physical thing looking at how this thing was made perhaps. Do you find there’s a tension there? Because you’re doing this installation work then the making of it isn’t so key in the viewer’s experience perhaps?
N M: Well it’s not so key for the viewer’s experience, but for me it is. It’s just the pleasure of making it that’s just part of it for me really.
A S: You know how you were saying how one material leads you onto the next. Is it something in the process itself which leads you on or....
N M: Well there’s always an interest, I always want to try something else, even if it’s not working for what I’m going to do. But the decisions made for these steel pieces for instance were influenced by what it needs to do, so it needed to be the strongest, but at the same time to be the least seen and then also still give me rigidity, so it has to do all these things I’m trying to do. So it’s just trying to work out what’s going to be best, and in order to do this I need to learn these processes, which is fun in itself for me.
A S: You know you were saying how you work quite intuitively but like you were saying it has to be planned at the same time....
N M: Well it is planned to a certain degree but I mean the plan kind of is in my head. When I was in these spaces I used to just document them and literally just spend a couple of days in them without really doing anything just to be in the space you know. Obviously I have to do measurements and work it out. But I’ll be in there and I’ll just be looking around and it will just kind of work and I can just see it. I think I just make basic general measurements based on the space that I can see because I can already see it.
Links:
www.axisweb.org/seCVPG.aspx?ArtistID=16132
Interview conducted live online, (August 2012)