What are your earliest memories regarding being drawn towards painting?
My first encounter with art was through my older sister, who used to come home from school with a bulging art folder filled with textile work and intricate drawings of figures with clothing designs that she would later create, seeing her work really interested me.
As a teenager I was into skateboarding. There was an underground Hip-Hop scene in Omagh at the time, skateboarding, break-dancing, mainly teenagers, and some older guys, and through that, I got into Graffitti. I would go with friends to find free wall space, under bridges or at an abandoned quarry. We would have fun and recreate sketches from our books into full colour pieces, we would take pictures of the work with cheap disposable cameras and get them developed for our own collection. I still have a bunch of those sketchbooks and photo albums which are a cool thing to have and reflect upon. Those teenage years of alternative expression and creativity really catalysed my interest in pursuing art further. My grandad, on my mum’s side, had made some art, watercolour paintings of trips to Donegal, that sparked something in me also.
One of my earliest memories of seeing art in a gallery setting was in New York when I was in my mid teens. I went to the Met museum and Museum of Modern Art. I remember being overwhelmed looking at four enormous Cy Twombly paintings of the seasons with their graffiti-like etched surfaces. I hadn’t encountered modern painting like this before, the sheer scale of the work stopped me in my tracks, the work itself made me feel present but elsewhere at the same time. I was drawn to how there was text scrawled through layers of colour and painted forms that seemed to be hanging in this atmospheric negative space but the work also moved backwards and forwards through the building of layers, wiping away or scratching away but leaving text still visible. I looked at a lot of work through both those museums and those pieces still stand out in my memory. Like a good song, you seem to always repeat it in your head either remembering it entirely or remembering how it made/makes you feel.
Did you get support at school or at home?
I did get support from my family, when it came to university subject choices my parents were aware of my interest in the subject from my A-Level work. Their motto was “If you are happy, then go ahead and do it.”
What about school?
I struggled in school up until year 10 or so. I had behavioural issues and can put that down to the classes being so boring and regimental. I went to an all boys Christian Brothers Grammar. Looking back now there were some fun times especially in the older years when I had classes that I was actually interested in.
What about support for your art at school?
At one point, my art teacher took me aside and convinced me that I had something worth pursuing. But it needed to not be graffiti, and the route of ‘anti-social behaviour’. I remember laughing and she smirked about it all too but the penny dropped for me. She was very enthusiastic about the arts and she had a great impact on me. It was after that discussion that I started to shift towards fine arts and university.
That teacher’s name was Nuala Grew, she studied art at Belfast School of Art, she was still a practising sculptor when she was teaching, she brought that enthusiasm into the classroom and made school a positive place to be. Other influential teachers were Terri Sweeney, and Paula Mallon; they taught History of Art. Great teachers, really supportive, and opened our minds to mainly Western art, Greek and Roman architecture, Design and History. A solid foundation for higher education.
Did you go on to third level education?
Yes, I attended John Moores School of Art in Liverpool 2005, graduating 1st Class Honors in 2008. I was the youngest on the course and the first student in 25 years to get accepted onto the course without a foundation degree. All the other students had worked on all sorts of different skills, screen printing, sculpture, life drawing, etching, during their foundation course, and I hadn’t done any of that. In fact in many ways I didn’t fully understand the transition between school and university, but my teachers supported me and suggested I just go for it. That is why after my undergraduate degree I decided to do a Post Graduate Cert in Art Teaching because I wanted to have that effect on young people that those art teachers had on me.
I didn’t do an MFA at the time because I felt that I needed to learn how to keep my work going independently, which I think has paid off over time. It was tough at the start trying to find studio space, time/money and then the motivation to really dig deep and do work for yourself when nobody else is watching or checking in on you.
See more of Ronan Bowes’ work here – www.ronanbowes.com
