One is very much revered by English Heritage because they're doing a good job and it's
a lovely thing to belong to and I was very pleased to get the commission and it's a very
interesting project because it's to do with words and language and colour and everything
else and so far touch wood it's going alright. (laughs)
I was brought up in the sixties and I think the influences from that time have never left
me. And I wanted to be a poster artist when I was, like, seven and I used to make up adverts
in my drawing book with lettering on and things like that. And my grandfather was a sign writer
for British Rail. In those days it wasn't called British Rail it was called London North
Eastern Railway because I come from Darlington County Durham which is on the main line between
Edinburgh and London. Big railway town. So there was no real call for people in 1955
when I left school at 14 for poster artists because they were all making locomotives and
bridges and things like that. But nevertheless I kind of persevered.
To start with printing always was black ink, white paper. And if you wanted to use a colour
you used red. And I've been trying to kick against that my whole life, you know, get
away from this printing background if you like and move into another area and I started
to develop the colour thing in about 91/92. I was leaving the black and white behind.
So I found these weird colours like awful pinks and browns and funny greens and things
but they were kind of interesting when you combined them with other colours. So I used
a Pantone book as a reference just to give me an idea of what made that colour, like
you mixed it with yellow and with this and with that and you got that. And I never quite
got it like that. But I got an interesting colour all the same.
And I think it's a kind of backlash against the high end of digital technology and everything
is instant and so quick and so fast. The world is speeding up so much. So we are like tortoises
plodding along like that, steadily. And you can fly now to Australia in one go and things
like that they're talking about.
But I don't want to do that, you know. I'd rather take my time.
The world is full of visual material constantly.
You are blasted by adverts and billboards and TV ads. It's all words words words.
The first thing one does at school when you're five years old or whatever it might be, you're
taught to read and learn the alphabet. Words and the alphabet become very powerful symbols
to recognise and work with.
Turps.
This type is very, very old. It's like a hundred years old. It's still in good condition because
it's made of very hard wood. And most of these letters have been cut by hand and they've
been knocking around printers' workshops for generations, and the more they get used the
better they are.
20/21, people, climate, handbook, belief, sea, language, land.
The land. You know, this jewel set in the silver sea. I've noticed that if you travel
from one county to the next, there's a marked difference. The change. That slight, that
subtle change between one county and the next. The fields look different, the field patterns,
the colours look different. It's remarkable. You have to be very observant to see it. So
that for me is a very English thing, the counties and the county changes. The whole heritage
of the thing is fascinating from Dover Castle to Stonehenge, such a vast degree of change
in history within quite a short compass. Even though it's a small country in a way, there's
a vast change in it from one place to the next. So it's got this rich... tapestry. All
these words are linked, aren't they? Land, sea, climate. So land for me is a fragile
quality which is delicate and got to be nurtured and looked after.
As soon as I get the brief, and these days it comes on the email mainly, used to come
on the phone, whatever I'm doing this takes over straight away because I believe in jumping
on something immediately while it's fresh and it's there. I do the print-out and I make
doodles on the email, my first thoughts. And then those are transferred into my sketchbook.
And then, it doesn't stay on the page too long, I then go straight to the material I'm
using which is the woodblock type and the inks and then I take it further.
Once you've found something that you love, then you must pursue it to the very end and
keep at it and work at it. You can't just pick it up one day and leave it the next,
you've got to constantly pursue it. I'm very impressed with people like Frank Auerbach
for instance, and David Hockney. Big fans of those two. They work every day. Hockney
draws every day. Auerbach paints every day. And they're both older than me. (laughs) And
I admire that tenacity of intent, forever striving at something and they don't give
up, they keep at it. And I think as a designer you should do the same thing.