NICK ELPHICK

Welsh artist Nick Elphick has spent 14 years attempting to understand form alongside with the human condition – particularly expressions and emotions – by intertwining his studies of fine art with anatomy. He has gained a reputation working alongside Damien Hirst and Jean-Paul Gaultier, with his most notable works including the Queen, Victorian explorer HM Stanley and Motörhead’s Lemmy.

One of the sculptor’s latest projects is a memorial statue of Tom Pryce, the only Welshman to win a Formula One race, in his home town of Denbigh. Buzz talks to Elphick about this and his other work.

In what way do you think art can influence the subconscious in viewers?

To me art is really personal to the individual. All I’ve got to do in my work is have an idea where I go, but after that I try to go into a ‘flow-mode’ where I let my subconscious sculpt and guide my hands, and I don’t know what I’m going to get until it’s finished.

And do you think that’s a more honest way of sculpting?

Absolutely. I don’t like to explain my work too much because I think it detracts from it. Everyone has led a different life and so we read things differently; we even see things like colours differently.

Do you often revisit a piece once you’ve finished it?

My problem is that I’m never finished. I’m a perfectionist. I need a piece to say what I want it to say, and seeing it fresh can sometimes help you finish it, so yes I do. Except for a commissioned piece, which unfortunately I can’t revisit.

Do you think conscious thoughts can change or even ruin the true meaning of a piece of art?

That’s why I sculpt and paint because I’ve learnt so much from it. If you are experiencing two opposite emotions at the same time – for example, the more you love something the more you have the capacity to hate something – that can stop us seeing our own self-worth. I’ve had issues in my life where I’ve needed to sculpt to really understand the truth of where I’m coming from. It’s kept me alive and given me meaning, and I’ve found that it also helps others. That gives me a reason to get up out of bed every morning.

Elements of your work are reminiscent of Leonardo Da Vinci’s intensity and mathematical qualities, and the preoccupation with functions of the eye and how we view things. Are you constantly mindful of these things as you work?

I was obsessed with it when I was younger. I had a very formal teaching at university, learning the mathematical equations of beauty and those formal conventions. It’s like how maths was a language for Einstein; he was still able to be creative with it. You can’t write poetry without a language, and I think nowadays some of that formal training is lost.

Do you think the generation coming through lack the necessary skills to express themselves?

I constantly have young people coming to me for help because they’ve come out of university with no skills. They have extremely creative minds but aren’t taught skills whatsoever, which must be extremely frustrating. It’s only practice that can give you those skills, and you can only practice when you’ve had a formal training.

I think I was almost lucky because I was so severely dyslexic – I felt as though there was only one direction I could really go in, which is the one I had a passion for. I also lived in my studio, which was basically a tin shed, for over 10 years to keep my costs down, so I could keep practicing my craft, and I didn’t start showing or selling my work until I was comfortable with my style. That was difficult because you are never taught how to creatively sell yourself as an artist at university, and it was something I had to learn myself.

Are there any particular materials or tools that you have used consistently across your projects and why?

Clay. Especially water-based clay because it’s fluid and organic so you can carve with it, sculpt with it and take away or add very quickly. I can do things like stone carving, but it just takes too long. If I can work quicker, it gives me more of a chance to be creative. I like finding shortcuts for getting to where I want to go because then I get more time to experiment.

I don’t have any patience, so any piece I do I have to have passion for. I can’t make work just for money. Obviously, I do get commissions, but I do sometimes find them quite frustrating and I also don’t do massive amounts of gallery work. I experiment as well, so sometimes I’ll work with the clay dry and let it crack, and then use a carving tool to carve into that. I’ll play with different materials.

There’s a passion for animals evident in your recent work.

I come from two places because I do absolutely love animals and how they have no ego, they’re just free – and when I was a kid and struggling at school, all I would do was sketch animals constantly as an escape. The Horse, who also represents my dad [who died in 2017], is basically a mix of both the graphic and expressionistic areas. Nature is something I’m very close to.

How long did the Horse sculpture take from conception to completion?

Months, and I think that’s because it was my dad. I kept destroying it and starting again. The hair, at one point, was very graphic and realistic, and took me about three days. Then I stood back and looked at it and thought “What am I doing?” It didn’t fit with what I was trying to do with the whole piece, so I had to destroy it. Also, I originally thought I was just doing the portrait – I had no idea that I was going to make this big block as well. Now I realise that the block was imprisoning the sculpture, which is breaking through it. Like I said, I don’t know what I’m going to get until I’ve finished.

I found it cathartic to do – like I was able to connect with my dad. At first, I tried to do a sculpture of him but it was just too close to home; also, my professionalism wouldn’t allow me to believe that I had gotten close enough to capturing him, so I could have gone on forever. Then I thought that I would like to express him as an emotion, so a horse allowed me to capture him emotionally. I did two halves: one is more masculine and harsher and the other is soft and kind.

Which goes back to what you said about the honesty and freedom of animals, how they are able to encapsulate what you were trying to create.

Absolutely. He was called Horse as well.

Having been involved with the statue in memory of F1 driver Tom Pryce, what message do you think memorial statues can convey?

I’m really proud to have been involved with that statue and I loved learning about him and his nature. He wasn’t in it for his ego, he just loved the sport. I just felt there was a real relevance to it, so I locked my doors up and carved on my own. He wanted to be a perfectionist in what he did, and although there’s a difference in what we do I felt there was a similarity between him and me.

I got to talk to his friends and see what an important part of local history he was, so I felt a lot of pride in being able to do that – public statues are so important to local history. I really dislike when they are stuck up on a massive plinth, because it separates us from them, and as a child I never even noticed public statues because I didn’t connect with them or thought I could be anything like them.

Denbigh has a lot of job problems at the moment, and I think statues on ground level help people connect with the reality and history of the place, and to see that anyone can be anything. We’re all humans.

Who in the art world do you most admire? Who’s been the most influential?

When I was younger, I think Rodin because I loved the impressionism, the figurative masculine strength and his exaggeration of form – to the point where it’s almost absurd, but also looks right. Getting those two things are really difficult. But I also take inspiration from painters, people like Bacon and Munch.

Do you actually have the time to go and see any exhibitions?

At the moment I’m struggling to, but I need to. I’ve just been out to Rome on a long weekend, and also Prague. When I’m struggling for time to go out and get inspiration, I go to my books. I have thousands and thousands of books. One thing I do tend to do before starting a personal piece is research certain sculptors or painters like Bacon or Klimt and I’ll put up a large wall of their work for a while, then take it all down and not think about it for about a week until I start.

Many creative or sporting people have go-to music when rehearsing or training – do you have anything you listen for inspiration?

I tend to listen to an absolute mixture, from The Chemical Brothers to classical. It depends what mood I need to be in, like when I was sculpting Lemmy I was blasting his music. It’s a massive influence on a piece, so you have to be careful because it can really change your mood drastically.

Do you find that you swing between feeling very invigorated by what you do and also feeling trapped by it?

I get that a lot, especially at times when I’m working very prolifically because I’ll be working hard and feeling very passionate and proud – and then I’ll also have dark times where I feel like I don’t know what I’m doing or I’m not good enough. Basically, once your self-worth goes so does your passion for your work because you lose your motive. I find it a lot more difficult being in north Wales because you’re not always surrounded by other artists who are feeling the same way as you.

Do you know what you’re going to do next?

I’m going to go back to the piece of me View Self Worth, now that I’m in a different place. I have loads of concepts that I want to do from it, and once it’s finished I’m going to develop different concepts from it and sculpt different pieces from it.

At the moment I’m experimenting with a few new techniques and materials, using different chemicals. I’ve started using gravity working and seeing how that can increase the speed of my sculpting – which means that I can sculpt large and then scan.

Do new methods come around a lot?

With Entropy, I sculpted my ex-fiancée in clay and let her dry out, then wrapped her in material, soaked her, let that material dry out and slowly ripped parts of it off. I wanted to do this piece for a long time, but I was thinking “how am I going to mould this?”. I found photogrammetry, which allowed me to make a 3D model hundreds of pictures – I cast this in wax and then experimented with different materials. By the end of the process I found I was constantly using my own hands. I prefer photogrammetry over scanning because it leaves in all the mistakes which I love, and the chaos theory which it stands for – nature makes its own mistakes, which are beautiful. I liked that, because in my own work and my own life I’ve found that letting go of control gives you a lot of strength and freedom.

Nick Elphick is currently showing work as part of the By Invitation exhibition at Royal Cambrian Academy, Conwy until Sat 12 Oct. Nick also appears on Salvage Hunters – The Restorers, which will be back on the Quest channel at the end of 2019.

Info: www.nickelphicksculpture.co.uk