Self confessed image junkie and international artist Mark Pawson’s exhibition ‘Signs and Maps‘ will be arriving at the ‘Here and Now‘ gallery in Falmouth, Cornwall with the private view this Friday 6th November and running till 5th December. His work will be showcased including limited edition perspex signs, self published books, hand printed cards and other jewellery. I caught up with Mark for a quick chat.
Tell me about the venue for your exhibition?
There’s a shop/gallery in Bristol called ‘Here‘ and this place, ‘Here and Now‘ in Falmouth is the sister shop but it actually is run by Ben’s (who runs the Bristol branch) sister.
So you’ll be selling your products in the shop?
They’ve got a back room which is the gallery room and then there’s quite a bit of window space onto the street and, well I’ll see when I get there, but some things will be in the bag and then some pieces of work will be in the shop window. Then within the shop there’ll also be a section where Kate says she’s got lots of different display areas and shelving so she’ll dedicate one of those to my merchandise.
How come you have decided to do an exhibition now?
For a long time I just focused more on making things, making books, badges – I kind of avoided doing gallery shows, but I got on with getting back into it a bit more about two or three years ago. I think I was a little hung up on the idea that to do a gallery show you need a new body of work, a new series or a new style or idea – and I don’t really work in that way. I work in a way where I do lots of different things all the time, at the same time and that is, I guess, how I express myself as an artist, it’s how I represent myself. I’m not going to a big new series. So I realised then, that I could eventually do an exhibition, a show and put this work in.
I see that you like to work in quite a lo-fi way, what is it about this way of working that attracts you?
‘Lo-fi’ is a nice word but not really the best way to describe it. In terms of making things like books and I guess badges aswell, I like to make things a bit well, most of my work is hands on. So things like the books and bookworks I’ve done, usually I’ve done all the work. Collecting source material, doing the layouts, graphic design, doing the photography, printing the books and binding them. Usually I do everything or at least have a hand in everything. I like doing work that’s intelligable and that people can see there’s a hands-on approach. You know, people can look and think ‘I could do that if I wanted to’, it’s more accessible. It’s just the way that I’ve always done things and especially always having worked from a zero budget.
Where would you say your style comes from?
It’s a real jumble of lots of different things. I’m an image junkie and I really like graphic images and packaging and I’m still quite fascinated by pieces of ephemera, paper and I also like playing and experimenting with printing methods. So yeah, some kind of jumble of all those things together. When I started I off, I was using the photocopier as my main tool, which is a great device for creating artwork, layouts, fiddling around and doing experimental stuff. Also then, you can publish and print books. So that’s alot of how I learnt, playing around with photocopiers.
Do you prefer to work on the computer when an idea first comes or by hand?
I do but it’s just the hand – the hand makes things and I use the tools that I have available. Sometimes I like to get two computers and two printers next door. I like tools and techniques which i can use here, I do everything here in my flat. Again, it’s just something that I’ve always done and always managed to do.
How did your collaboration with Tatty Devine come about?
They’ve been good friends from probably when they opened the first shop in Brick Lane and they stocked my badges and cards. The first thing we did together was the ‘open and close‘ necklace and I sold it through their first shop but we’d never done a proper collaboration before and then one day I was just sketching out some ideas and I just decided to do an ‘open and close‘ necklace based on a very simple old fashioned open and close sign. They were doing alot of things with perspex at the time. I felt a bit weird about it because these were people that I knew very well but I was making quite a business approach and a proposition to them which was quite curious. They were working on a new collection at the time and they just covered the whole of their work table with paper and were just scribbling and sketching and I showed them the sketches I had and they looked at each other and they said “Yes! We like that Mark, can we have the finished artwork in two days time”. Which was, you know, all very nice and very easy. So I’ve done a couple of things with them.
Do you like to use social networking sites, is this important to you?
Nope, not really. I’ve got a website which everything is on. It’s a very distinctive, quite old style website. Most of my work is illustrated on there with a good picture, good description and a Paypal button. At the moments thats how it works. It’s making the information available. In earlier days I used to do mail order catalogues on the same basis which had a factual description and bit more of a blurb. When I was doing the mail order catalogues I used to do something interesting or quirky with them so they were a little bit more of an object that people would hang onto. One of the catalogues that I did, it was printed all black and white and it was a little bit like a stamp album so some of the pictures, like the book covers, I did separate strip colour prints which could be cut out and stuck into the stamp album. So I have currently have a website and that’s enough for the moment. Sometimes I just have to turn my computer off.
The exhibition will be on from 8th November – 6th December 2009 at Here and Now Gallery 41a Killigrew Street, Falmouth Cornwall.
Tags:
badgemaking, badges, here and now gallery, Mark Pawson, Signs and maps, Tatty Devine
