Kenyan British Artist, David Roberts, will hold his first London solo art exhibition at The Department Store, Brixton (Downstairs) from Thursday 29 August to Sunday 1 September 2024. Ahead of the opening, The Art collector, had the opportunity to ask the artist about his upcoming exhibition and body of work.
Can you tell us about your exhibition Nostaligia – its genesis and your choice of venue.
The place I grew up, in Lake Baringo, in Kenya’s Rift Valley, is completely submerged due to climate change induced floods. I’ve always been inspired by the natural world, but my recent work is influenced by unnatural events. Swarms of locusts, floods, invasive species. It’s a crisis of biblical proportions. Nostalgia is about the beauty that is to be found, however fleeting. I wanted to celebrate the overlooked but fundamental elements of life itself: wildflowers and pollinators, their magnificent but fragile beauty. Because life finds a way.
I chose to exhibit at The Department Store because I love Brixton and it’s a beautiful renovation.
You have used different mediums throughout your career. Which have been the most rewarding for you? As a follow-up question, can you tell us about your own multi-medium technique (how you developed it and why it is preferred)?
I trained in Florence in drawing, painting and printmaking and I also love experimenting with old fashioned techniques such as pin-hole photography. The biggest influence on my technique has been my use of encaustic wax to set the work. My work incorporates rice and tissue papers, paints and beeswax to build the painting, using different weights of layers to play with colour, translucency and light. Each of the layers are fragile, so you have to keep creating without killing it. Some colours darken, some lighten, some layers will hide, some will reveal themselves, creating a luminosity.
To what extent do you believe art should carry a message or be political? Or should art be ‘open to interpretation’?
Everything is open to interpretation and I love the fact that an audience will always bring their own meaning to the work. Grayson Perry said recently that the art world seems to have forgotten that art also needs to look nice, which made me smile. I’ve always focused on dramatic and wild landscapes and on the fleeting patterns, light and interactions of the natural world. This hasn’t always been fashionable but it feels like the world is starting to realise the importance of preserving nature.
“Nostalgia is about unnatural events in the natural world.” If climate change can be considered a catalyst for unnatural events, does Nostalgia seek to document life in its purest form, becoming almost a history record before life begins to change dramatically.
Absolutely. Climate change is accelerating the spread of invasive species, changing the world around us and our everyday experiences. By pressing flowers and combining with my traditional techniques, I’ve been able to capture the fragility of nature and preserve it in time. I’m interested in the dark realities of beauty. I often paint the adenium obesum, the desert rose. It’s a bonsai-esque flowering tree which flourishes in the harshest of environments, like in Kenya. The desert rose contains a poisonous sap. The poison was traditionally used by hunters to kill big game and enemies. I’m intrigued by this duality: That a traditionally pretty pink pollinating flower is actually deadly. Meanwhile, the insects which keep our ecosystem working, whilst reviled, are on close inspection, stunningly gorgeous.
To what extent should artists endeavour to make art more sustainable (given other industries are focusing on this)?
Kenya is on the frontlines of climate change so we feel the brunt, which means there’s alot of activism there. I do think the art world needs to consider its impact. I do my own framing using sustainable wood from a managed regenerative source of forest. My work is connected to the environment not only in its subject matter, but also in its materials. Setting paintings in encaustic wax instead of varnish is integral to creating an effect of light and depth, making each artwork delicate and translucent. And the beeswax is sourced from local Kenyan women’s cooperatives, which manage beehives and make honey, which is a big source of income.
As a follow-on question, do you believe the art world should become more sustainable (in terms of production and consumption)?
There’s a few basic rules I follow to reduce my carbon footprint, such as bringing works unframed when I exhibit internationally, to avoid shipping huge crates of heavy framed paintings. There’s no industry in the world that can avoid the difficult task of figuring out how to reduce emissions. The key is for the general public to be able to spot the difference between genuine sustainability and greenwashing.
Nostalgia is open daily from 10am – 5pm. Opens Thursday 29 August to Sunday 1 September 2024. Downstairs at The Department Store, Brixton, London.
Find David Roberts on Facebook and Instagram: @artbydavidroberts
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