The artist talks to us about preparing a space for creative work, engineering manuals and proves his love for darts.
1. Show us a sample of your work.
Composition X – Single colour lithographic print in mild steel angle iron case 560 x 450 x 20mm
Vanden Plas – Layered aluminium mounted chromogenic prints bonded to 18 – gauge steel sheet (British Leyland Cashmere Gold body colour / laquer) in mild steel angle iron cases 560 x 450 x 20mm
Epitaph I – Installation view, Webber gallery, London. Structural work of 7 high tensile 25mm reinforced steel bars, 20mm plate steel, acrylic paint – dimensions variable
Ritz – Layered aluminium mounted chromogenic prints bonded to 18 – gauge steel sheet (British Leyland Diamond White body colour / laquer) in mild steel angle iron cases 560 x 450 x 20mm
Tomorrow. Today – Layered hand polished laser cut 18 – gauge cold rolled steel sheet in mild steel angle iron case 560 x 450 x 20mm
2. What research is currently most informing your practice?
I have been researching and sporadically clearing a site for the past six months with the intention of using it for the construction of some kind of earth/site work. The research is informed by the geology, industrial history and experience of the place, which I’ve arrived at through the exploration of previous ideas and findings. It feels like an appropriate place to pause and perhaps attempt the realisation of something entirely new.
3. Which photograph are you obsessed with right now and why?
I found an old volume of engineering manuals a few months back, each one is filled the most beautiful photographic illustrations – it’s innately honest and it’s basic reality of documenting for instructional purposes has such a fascinating purity and incidental serial merit.
4. What video can you not stop watching?
5. Can you give us five links to things you think we should know about?
http://www.designers-books.com/vision-value-gyorgy-kepes-1965-1966/
http://reverberationradio.com/
http://peterblumgallery.com/artists/david-rabinowitch
6. How many photos do you have right now on your phone? Please share one…
and feel free to give us some context if you feel like it.
Few hundred I guess, 132 checkout the other week.
7. Can you send us a pic of your desk/workspace?
8. What is the most coveted photo book you own and why?
Some Steel by Garth Evans, it’s everything that excites me about a photo book, a rare thing.
9. What concerns you?
In a broader sense, too much to put in any sort of meaningful list, in a personal sense, too much to put in any sort of meaningful list.
10. What makes you happy?
Trying to make things in my garage, peace, fresh air.
About Theo: Theo Simpson’s collective works reflect on mythical themes relating to landscape and industrial heritage, investigating the instability of the post-industrial landscape and its cultural and physical borders, through the examination of materials, ruins, objects and experiences encountered and created. FOAM Paul Huf Award Nominee – 2017. Upcoming exhibition: Webber Gallery at Unseen, Amsterdam – September 22-24.