And

Ellen Wagstaff

Becoming an Artist

Max tells me that his journey into art began when he was a child:

“Both my parents are creative. My Dad was a photographer and my mum was a florist. Then kind of, from that, there are pencils and there is large paper around the house, so you doodle, you draw, you mess around and just have a bit of fun with it. Then going through school, I found an enjoyment in art. I suppose I just really followed that. It wasn’t about feeling I was good at the subject, it was enjoyable as well and that was the key thing for me. Just enjoying.”

Perhaps the most interesting thing about Max’s journey however that makes him really stand out is how he found his route into university level study. Unlike lots of students, Max left his A Levels to do an Art Foundation course at City, London. 

“I started A levels but it didn’t go so well in my other subjects so I left my A Levels and went and did an Art Foundation. The weird thing about the foundation is that they normally want people to have A levels but they were taking people just on portfolios. So, it gave me a nice chance to get onto a foundation without the A Levels because I hadn’t got them, because I was struggling with other subjects.”

Not only did this choice allow Max to continue onto further study, but it was also a period for enjoyment and self-expression. In fact, studying an art foundation is something which he would recommend to budding young artists or, indeed, any young people looking to explore themselves or their art: 

“An Art Foundation is just amazing really. It’s just this really freeing course. If you go into an art foundation with an open mind you can only learn and enjoy. Something for younger people to consider is the route they take. You know, you can do your A Levels and then do an art foundation and then do a “proper” degree. It’s just a year’s course, it doesn’t cost anything. So, you can go and do this foundation, have a year, have a fun, creative time and then maybe go and do a law degree or whatever you feel like but you’ve had that experience and a little bit of a creative kick. I absolutely loved my art foundation. It’s a really freeing course because there’s a bit of writing and making sure your sketchbooks are good but it’s all about exploration.”

Having completed the art foundation course, Max studied at Slade School of Fine Art in London:

“Slade is completely fipped to the other side. It’s seen as a very good art school. That’s a varying term. There are a lot of artists who have come out of it who are great household names, but it’s the least structured art school in the country. It’s like, “here’s a studio: go”. It’s wonderful, but there’s not much support and you’ve kind of got to find your own way. I built my own structure into this unstructured university. We always throughout early school learn through a structure, and that’s what I applied to my degree. I studied materials and then mark making and then composition and through that studying of very fine details, I became able to look at a small section of a painting and interpret what the artist was feeling at that time. Whether a mark seems nervous, whether they were worried about that mark. So, through that study, I improved my painting a little bit, but I improved my experience of looking at art ten-fold.”

Learning to Look

Max explains to me the importance of observation. He tells me how he learnt to look at artworks and to talk about other people’s work:

“Being able to look at art and just go really go close and look at how the brush carried across the canvas, or the compositional choices, these small elements became really important to me. It does benefit my painting being aware of all of these things but the thing that I enjoy the most is using that skill to view at other people’s work and being able to talk about other people’s work with them.”

He tells me about a particular moment where he was able to discuss an artist’s work with her.

“There was a moment just before the final show, and there was this other painter and she really wanted to do this bold mark in the middle of this painting that she’d slaved over for months. She was really nervous about it and I said if you’re nervous about it don’t do it because it will be a nervous mark sitting in the middle of the canvas. If you’re confident about it go for it. But then if you want a nervous mark then maybe be nervous and do it. We had a really long discussion about it. It’s interesting to be able to have that perspective.”

When Max worked at Sotheby’s he experienced observing famous works, seeing the confidence in the brush strokes used by certain artists such as Richter and Bob Ross, considering the techniques used but also the artists’ approaches and feelings.

Working in the World of Art

While Max was at university, he spent his summer working at an art conservation studio. 

“Suddenly I realised that there was a completely different side to art. You’ve got this messy studio and then this pristine perfect studio with the tiniest brushes you’ll ever see to fix the tiniest cracks, this amazing world of what people do to keep art safe. That influenced how I view, handle and make art.”

Since then, Max has worked at Sotheby’s for the past two and a half years.

“That was another different view on the art world. You realise that for the big auction houses it’s not about the art it’s about the money. It’s about the money and not damaging it. It’s like ‘Max can you go and get that, set it up, it’s worth four million’. That kind of money is unfathomable for most people. It’s a really interesting world to see and I’m thankful that I’ve worked in it but I wouldn’t work in it again, personally. But it is for some people. It is loads of money and the Christmas parties are insane, it’s luxury at its best.”

Having left Sotheby’s Max has returned to painting and has turned his bedroom into a studio. He has also started working with Core Arts, an organisation which promotes positive mental health and wellbeing through creative learning. This involves, music, poetry, art, dance and gardening to name a few. 

“It’s really benefitted me having that day a week when I have to get out of the house and go to this class and make work with them, it’s not focused on my actual practice but I’m having fun doing it. The curing power of being creative is something’s that’s insane. I see art as a way out for people. It’s a tool to help you clear your mind and move forwards.”

Moving Forward

Having listened to Max’s past experiences, I asked him where he felt his journey would take him next.

“I’d love to just continue painting. It’s not a financially viable thing without a reasonable amount of success but at the moment I’m doing this for myself and only sharing it with a select group of people. For me, it’s quite a closed process. But I do see myself sharing it and being more public about it and maybe that will bring some sort of success with it. I’m going to try and get some part time work and ease myself into some sort of normal routine. Part-time job, part-time painter. That’s the perfect balance for me. I realised working full time isn’t really for me. I want to push my practice forward alongside work.”

According to Max, making art is what is important. Whether that art is earning money for you or whether you are having to earn money through another job in order to support yourself while you make art, the main focus should be on what is right for you as an artist.

Max’s Favourite Works

Max told me that these were his favourite works out of all the artworks he has made because they all gave him a feeling of some sort. One work was selected because it was created during a period of unhappiness and was a form of expression during that time, another was the culmination of a degree programme which affected an audience in a very memorable way. Max’s selections were based almost entirely on how the works made him feel, what memories and feelings they brought back and how they spoke to him as an artist.

Feeling Art

I noticed that throughout the conversation Max had spoken about how art feels. When I asked him about his choice of words, he explained that focusing on the way art feels is very important to him.

“For me, feeling and look and even touch can become important to an artwork. I’ve had hands on a lot of stuff that people will never touch and will never be allowed to. The feel of those works is really important. The actual touch can tell you a lot about a work. Certain works you’ll think look interesting and when you pick it up you realise what is actually is.”

He gave an example of one of Anthony Gormely’s works which he handles at Sotheby’s.

 “You’re like, ah ok, Gormely hasn’t just stuck bread on a board, he’s stuck bread on a sheet of steel in a frame and it weights so much! It was a massive piece and it’s bread with little bites out of it that make his figure and it was just a white background, but that was actually a sheet of steel. It’s that little touch that goes: that’s Anthony Gormley because it’s heavy and because that’s his aesthetic”.

Max also explained how the emotional feeling of art can be important.

“If a painting makes me feel sad and makes you feel happy, then that’s still completely valid. If you go and look at something and you think that’s a bit rubbish, that’s fine. You’re allowed that. And you’re allowed to think things that look a bit rubbish are amazing. That’s the beauty of art.”

He further explains that art isn’t necessarily about making something ‘good’. It is about doing something that you enjoy and that makes you feel good.

“Just write down a little poem or a story, do a little doodle and then scrunch it up and throw it in the bin. It’s for you. It’s picking up a pencil and doing whatever. It doesn’t matter. Just enjoy the pencil making a mark on the paper.”

“It’s Not Very Good”

Max talked to me about that feeling that we have all had; the little voice in our head that says the work we have just made “is not very good”.

“The only difference between the scribble you do on a piece of paper and the scribble Picasso did on a bit of paper is that he was Picasso and you’re not Picasso. But it doesn’t mean your scribble is any less of an artwork than his.”

One of his suggestions was to go to art galleries (or any place where you can view the sort of art you make) with someone who is not an artist.

“Their opinion will be different to yours and you’ll have some hilarious conversations about artwork. I remember going to the Tate [London] to see … with a mate and I went ‘that’s a snail’ and he went ‘no it’s not, that’s a bunch of squares mate’ and then we just wandered off. Snail or not, it doesn’t matter, we had a laugh in front of the work. What you’ll realise is that your friend will think that that artwork that’s worth millions of pounds, everyone praises it, your friend thinks it’s rubbish. Every artwork, someone thinks it’s rubbish and someone doesn’t like it and that means that yours, if you like it and someone else thinks it’s rubbish, it still could probably go in the Tate. It’s not down to that one person who thinks it’s rubbish.”

He also emphasised the importance of valuing your own opinion.

“If someone tells you that you are using the material wrong, no you’re not. You’re using it differently. You are being very innovative. You are the maker and destroyer of your art. People’s opinion of your work will change over time and that’s just how it is. But your opinion on your work can always be your opinion and it’s the most powerful opinion”

Max’s Top Tips

1. “Always have paper and a pen or pencil with you. You never know when you’ll have that urge to draw or you’ll have an idea. Draw the shop at the other side of the road, draw the person sitting at the bar opposite. It’s those tiny moments that can kind of cascade into a massive amount of creative ideas. It can be messy, but it can be fun.”

2. “Understand that criticism comes from a good place. It’s not there to attack your work. We’re here to say ‘I don’t like that, but maybe if you look at this artist you can maybe learn something’. Learn how critiques work. It’s hard to explain and it’ll be hard to grasp completely, but the more you get used to talking about art, the more you can see how helpful criticism can be. Use it as a learning experience”.

3. “Work with what you have. Getting a studio can be difficult. That doesn’t stop me from making work. There’s always a way you can be creative whether that’s using a small pack of watercolours in your garden or on your desk in your room, whether it’s a huge work or whether it’s tiny, it’s just down to doing it. It might be you make a load of small paintings, but you don’t see them as paintings because they’re really small, that’s fine, they’re painting plans, they’re plans for your bigger paintings when you get your studio!”

4. “Enjoy it. Whatever you have to do to enjoy it, do that. If you have to listen to really loud music and dance around you room while doing a tiny bit of the painting, even if you’ve done more dancing than painting, just enjoy it.”