Conducted by Gregory Barton

(Laughter) No way! First? Well, I mean, actually it’s very accidental in a way. I ended up going to college, Bath College (and I like this story). It was the first book that was nearest the door, really, in the careers office, you know. I just put my hand in, that’s the book, I pulled out ‘Bath’ & caught a plane to Bath. Bath college was probably …, I could ‘ve gone anywhere but it turned out Bath was the best place to be. It was like …, I was into architecture and that, Bath is renowned for it’s classical and, you know, it’s architecture and everything. So, I mean it was great, I enjoyed it, that’s really how I got into it.

I mean, and before that - you know, it’s really funny actually - before that I was doing A-level art, yeah; so it was the only thing we could do. That was one of these schemes and that, yeah; and I worked out, well, I can’t be doing this for the rest of my life; and it was just coming to the end of these schemes. Too much like hard work, you know! We …, so we went down, me and my mate, and we just went in and said: ‘I’d like to do this ‘O’-level’, they said: ‘Sorry you can’t do any of those’, ‘What?’, ‘Well, you haven’t done them before, see’. You know, so it’s like if we’ve done them before we wouldn’t want to do them, would we. So they said: ‘Go to …’ - oh no, that’s another story! Anyway, so they looked at me and said: ‘Look, we can see you’ve done ‘O’-level art, so you can probably do A-level art. Go along and see the teacher about it’. So, that was really how I accidentally got in; it was due to I couldn’t get into anything else.

Well, I went back to college in ’85 so, I’d consider, from then on really. I mean, we’ve always been drawing; I mean, actually, when I had applied to …, when I was in school, of course my favourite subject was art, yeah. And you know, I thought how can I use this, I’d like to do more in this. So, I went to the careers officer, and it was all a joke, really. The most interesting thing, really - it’s gone full circle - is that I can remember going into the careers office and saying: ‘Look, I’d like to do record covers’ and he just said: ‘Sorry, there’s no such fucking job like’, and so that was that put off, and then I was just told to, perhaps, to go to art college; but I did apply for graphic design - my cousin was doing it - that’s all I knew, really, about art at that time was graphic design. So, I got into college but I didn’t have enough ‘O’-levels to actually go in, so that was that. Then I didn’t go to college and started work.

Well, I suppose, at the moment my biggest influence is radio. I hate thinking, you know. So, if I’ve got the radio on or something in the background it stops me thinking and I can carry on working.

Well, I mean, you know, it’s no symbolism or representation in here. But I’d like to sometimes put some sneaky messages in or just do something a bit - (pause) some fun to see if anybody gets it. You know, because sometimes so many people take 2 minutes to look at a picture; but if you really want to judge a good work of art, one of the ways I use to judge a good bit of work of art is if you come back to it. So, I mean, you try putting - I don’t know about messages as such - but you try putting as much information in it as possible.

Well, for this one we’ve just … - you know, I’m making it up as I go along. Well, you could say one of the biggest influences for a piece of work would be the work itself. So, if I am, the size and the panels, yeah. I mean, these are doors which have been …, they were gonna go up horizontal, but I decided for vertical. That was when, I think, one of the security guards said: ‘Perhaps we should do them vertical’, and we had these panels. So, anyway, so this all fitted in. I was gonna try vertical anyway; and then …, so if I’m looking at the shape of the work, you know, that will influence exactly what goes on in it as well, so/thus the shape of the work.

I was just offered to submit some portfolio work, because they’ve been …, they were aware of what was, I mean, of some of the work, you know, ‘cos I’ve been exhibiting for a while in Cardiff and Penarth. So, he (Nicky Wire) is apparently a frequent …, he frequently visited the gallery, I suppose; and it just went from there then, I mean, it had been slowly building up over a couple of months. And then I went up to London and met their PR manager and that; took my portfolio work and they seemed to like it a lot, whether… - well that’s what they told me anyway.

Well, Cardiff County Council! I’m not from Cardiff but they seem a lot like a Neath council, so they’re probably made up of very perfect people, and people who are generally better than everybody else. They don’t live in our world, so, anything that they don’t like, something that doesn’t go along with their guidelines to how we should all be and act. You know, this is the frightening thing, they’ve got the power to take things down. I mean, they didn’t do it in a very professional manner either. They didn’t come and talk to us, or to see what we were doing, first of all. They just went in there, heads strong like a bull in a china shop, I suppose, and they just fucking ripped the thing down. There was no…, we couldn’t talk to them, couldn’t get any sense out of them. It was quite disturbing, really, that Cardiff has got people like that in charge of it.

Well, I mean, if you think the word ‘Fuck’ is controversial! Everybody who I’ve spoken to swears, I mean, there’s nothing controversial about that. I don’t make up anything that isn’t already out there, I don’t see how it can be controversial because all I’m doing is just relaying things which exist anyway and, you know, time will be the judge really, not these people.

Well, I’ve always been interested in art and that’s exactly what it’s primarily about. It’s about art, it’s about painting, it’s about how to construct paintings, it’s about finding the hidden painting – it could be anywhere. I don’t tackle it too much with a set idea, I just go straight in and see what I come out with. I mean, you use a lot of intuition and accidents happen and go off in other directions, (pause) so that’s that.

Well no, that was all crap that was. I just said that, because, just to get attention for the work. I thought it was a good case of…, the way I judge myself is that it’s my job to get the work seen and, you know, I say things just to get the attention that I need to show the work. I mean, once I got it out there, the work will speak for itself. So, whether I’m saying there’s bodily fluids in it or nothing it doesn’t matter to the end result of the picture.

And then saying that I have also used sperm and things on it which was nothing but a bit of a disaster. I mean, I had sperm in a condom, which I had decided to blow up and the fucking thing exploded and covered sperm everywhere (laughter), over everyone (laughter). But then this was at a point of time when…; I’m talking to you about it now and I’m sure you can see how funny it was - but can you imagine talking to somebody who’s a fucking prude, about what you’ve done like, and these are the people who were in a certain gallery that went ahead and fucking cancelled the show after that small, little interview I’d done with them. I don’t think they found it funny at all, like that, and she was offended with the word ‘Vagina’ written all over the fucking thing; but we say things and I’d like to leave it as…, is it a true thing or not a true thing ? It’s a sceptical thing.

Well, you know; the majority of people can’t be shocked. I mean, I suppose if they use the word ‘Fuck’ so many times in their vocabulary, they don’t actually appreciate what it is. It’s just like a couple of lines on paper, but that particular way of, you know, the senses of people that have built up, of understanding words and actually how they use words in their brain is a conflict which I try to use. So, if it shocks anybody it’s usually because their brain has been stimulated and if I’m trying to stimulate people, I suppose, yeah, shocking is a part of that, but it’s not the main ingredient in the work.

The arts in Wales? I haven’t. The years I’ve spent in Wales I don’t particually like a lot of the art that’s been produced here. I think it’s weak, I mean, there’s a lot of good people here, but I’m a very critical person and I apply my own criticism especially to my own work. So, if I’m looking at somebody else’s work I apply the same criticism to them. They might be the nicest persons in the world, and I know a lot of people who take it personally, you know, when you say something about their work, but you know it should be hard. It should be a hard game we’re in, and you know if your soft about art and that, then it’s just too bad. Because I think the art in Wales needs to start stepping up and putting their foot down on the gas, so to speak, and start fucking coming forward with stronger ideas and that, you know. I suppose, if anything… hopefully the generation below coming up now, will see things being done and influence them to be a bit more, well, you know, outrageous, a bit more creative with what they do, rather than the safe things that people keep throwing at them.

No - more sitting down. I’m a lazy bastard myself, I’ve been standing up for too long. I mean, I would like to think that if you wannabe…, if your doing something you want to be the best at doing it. I mean, that’s the way I think of it. So, if I’m doing a painting, I’m trying to do the best painting I can, and not try to think that somebody else can do anything else better than me. I’m trying to do…, think of myself as the best whether that’s true or not. Again, only time can tell like, you know. Everybody’s got their own judgement, everybody thinks. I mean, a lot of people think it’s great work that I do and then, yet, there’s probably the same amount of people and maybe more, who think it’s the worst bit of shit they’ve ever seen in their life. So we’ll come back to that probably, I mean, as long as you’r keeping your work out of any challenging things, that’s all you can do.

Yes, I could. No, I can’t. Again, we make it up as we go along and I’m looking at it and all I’m trying to do…, I mean, I could’ve done something which is pretty much straightforward but what I’ve…, the difference between this and, say, what we’ve done with the billboard is that I’m using this place as a studio, you know, where I’m investigating the painting and so. I’ve got no perception of how it will look. I just trust my judgement to a certain extent, and there we go. It’s changed dramatically in the last week or so, and sure, it may change dramatically again; we’ll just have to see how it goes, I mean, there’s lots of nice little pieces happening in there. And I’m just happy to carry on working on it at the moment.

I don’t have any long-term future goals and I’ve never had ambition, and you might find that strange to know, but all I’ve tried to do is put work together, which I can learn from, you know. And it happens to be now that people are…, I must be doing work which is quite striking, and if so I can carry on doing that, you know. I wouldn’t say I’m happy because, it’s a sort of catch 22 - if you’r happy it’s usually short lived. So, long term goals – I haven’t any. I mean, I’ve always wanted to work big and I’m getting that, I’ve done that. I suppose long term goals, if any - suppose I’d like to do even bigger paintings. That’s what I really aim for doing.