Automatic Drawing: My Barmaid Friend “Gemma Mermaid Hair”

Today Gemma Byrne friend/ barmaid enquired over twitter about a drawing I promised her. I always call her “Gemma Mermaid Hair” as she has beautiful sea goddess locks. I wanted to do a kind of Illustration in my doole style a bit like the Lady Gaga Mermaid I use for my twitter profile. I like combining automatic drawings with pattern and shapes, trying to create a distrinctive visual and poet language with my drawings. Eventually I want to move into print and explore doing some street art murals on grotty boarded up areas in Doncaster.

For now, I didn’t get very far. I drew “Mermaid Hair” from a photograph on instagram then re-photographed it and applied some effects on top via a free iphone app. Mermaid Hair seemed to like the results and instagrammed it back to the world.

Drawing is a real passion of mine and recently I have been trying to draw in a realistic way after spending a good few years doodling. I am always really inspired by gifted painters and draftsman, even if the contemporary artworld may sneer. My favourite young contemporaries are Matt Small and Zac Walsh, both whom I met during my time at the Novas Gallery back in 2006-2007. They both have a lot of technical skill and I really admire that in their work. There’s a strong balance between concept and the quality of the work being produce. Such talents.

For a good few years now I’ve struggled to move my drawings out of the sketch book and into final developed piece. My work usually manifests into happenings or installation/interventions. This makes my approach to making art panoramic, more like a director than artisian. Drawing always brings me back down to earth and enables my thoughts to become linear again and that’s just needed in this crazy world mashed-up world.