» Artists Of Frome

WITH STEVEN JENKINS

We talk to Steven about his love of abandoned buildings and doodling in margins. We also award him an imaginary prize for the best dog name ever.

What is your artistic background? I studied Printmaking/Illustration after a Foundation course, which lets you dip your toe into all sorts of things. Trouble is then you have to decide which of those you want to carry on with.

What made you follow this path? I was only ever ‘good at art’ so fought to go to college, and thankfully won.

What is your physical creative process? What materials and techniques do you use? I work with both ceramics and print, so I cast and slab-build my pottery and, as with the printmaking, the decorative angle is the most enjoyable part. I mainly work with lino in print, but am a member of the Bat Print Studio at the Silk Mill so I can work on stone and plate lithography and the fabulous presses they have there. What inspires your work? Well… such a broad range of things. I collect all manner of tat and am always picking things up on walks that ‘may be useful’. I love old and abandoned buildings where nature starts to reclaim them - and any wild part of the country, especially the coast.

How did lockdown affect the way you work and create? Alternating periods of stagnation and mad creativity! Thankfully I settled latterly to something in the middle. I turned my tiny dining room into a work area and am still using it to start and finish work. I always work funny hours so it is handy to work late or get up early and just continue, with everything there waiting.

Where do you work from? Tell us about your studio. The Silk Mill is my main work area. I’ve worked in a shared studio there since 2013, and thankfully we’ve had access for most of lockdown. I share with a stained glass artist, Jenny Raggett, so there is a lot of crossover with ideas and techniques.

What is your favourite place to be for artistic inspiration? Probably a coastal walk, ideally Dorset or the North Pembrokeshire coast (where I grew up), though any bit of woodland or rolling hills will do. Failing that, almost any museum. My particular favourite is in Heraklion in Crete, and also the Neues Museum in Berlin - though I love small town museums, always full of surprises and intimate histories.

Which artists inspire you, and why? Gosh, hard to pick out, but my tutors at college introduced me to Bawden and Ravilious and other illustrators of the early twentieth century. I love John Minton, Christopher Wood, John Piper - people that captured a moment, or social details, experimented with media . I also love older work, primitive, folky, naive - Elizabethan portraits, eighteenth century textiles...

If you hadn’t become an artist, what would you have done? Maybe a teacher, as I do enjoy teaching both print and ceramics. Or possibly a researcher, but only if you got to doodle in the margins of your copybook. How do you find the Frome area, in terms of creativity and artistic community? Frome has been great for me in terms of meeting and working with other artists across a wide spectrum. Also Frome has a receptive audience, which is hugely important, and we are lucky to have a broad selection of artists and musicians. Few towns of this size can boast such a wide range of talent.

Are there any artistic processes/disciplines which you haven’t worked in/with, but would like to? I am interested in other print processes but I have strayed all over the place already, so feel I should keep to what I know, at least for the moment.

How can people see and buy your work? I have work on show during the Festival in July - and have an Etsy Shop - https://www.etsy.com/uk/ shop/HogweedPotsnPrints

www.hogweedart.co.uk

Instagram is the easiest way to see what I am up to - @hogweedpotsnprints

Anything else you’d like to add? I have a dog called Turnip!