Modernist artist Garth Evans has showcased his work worldwide, and last year was the subject of a fundraising campaign to save one of his biggest sculptures, commemorating the mining industry in Wales. He discusses his upcoming artistic return to south Wales with Lily Donelly.
Your parents and grandparents were Welsh, and Cardiff was the initial home to one of your biggest sculptures in 1972, as part of a movement that propelled art into urban spaces. Does it feel like a homecoming to showcase your other works in Chapter?
It is very important to me that this exhibition, the first opportunity for a UK audience to see some of the work that I have made in the US, is taking place in South Wales. As a child we often visited an aunt and uncle in Bridgend. I have vivid memories from that time, particularly of the rocks at Ogmore. Rather than a homecoming, I think of it as a reconnection to something long cherished.
There was a fundraiser in place to repair the damage and deterioration your untitled sculpture has seen over the years. How did that come about?
This came about through the efforts of Hannah Firth at Chapter, who I am deeply grateful to – I believe she had help from my dear friend Tony Stokes.
Your sculpture conjures an image of a mining tunnel: could its need for reupholstering be interpreted as a comment on Welsh industry itself, with the threatened closure of the Port Talbot steelworks?
At the time, I thought its form, colour and material had associations with the mining and steel industries, but perhaps it could be something more than a comment. A memorial of sorts, with a permanent home in south Wales.
During the modernist period, your sculptures were inherently more structural and experimented with different materials. In the 00s, you ushered in a human form using warped faces. What made you do this, and why?
It just kind of happened. I made heads with my students that I recycled at the end of the class. They persuaded me to keep some of them, and when I took them out of the kiln, I was astonished – I recognised them as people I had known. Someone joked that I was trying to create my own audience with these ‘people’ populating my studio.
The title of your upcoming exhibition has religious connotations, alluding to the hamsa recognised by Islam and Judaism as a protection against the evil eye. What is it that your work defends, or exposes?
Of course, the hamsa! But I was not thinking about that when I came up with the title, instead about how my practice has evolved. Deciding to make only what I could with my own hands led me to a sense that, while we believe we are controlling our hands, this is not the case – it’s much more complicated.
If you could recommend one place in Wales to a first-time visitor that’s not on the tourist maps and off the beaten tracks, where would it be and why?
I love the Brecon Beacons and, of course, the rocks at Ogmore. If you are open to it, there is a unique magic in each of these places.
Garth Evans: But, Hands Have Eyes, Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff, Sat 14 Sept-Sun 26 Jan. Admission: free. Info: 029 2030 4400 / www.chapter.org