1971 – I was fourteen and we found a storage hut at school, next to the tennis court. We climbed in and nicked a few costumes. These were vintage clothes used for school plays. I stole a little black cape … Read More
In my adolescence, I visited the artist in a London flat. There was a room designated for the studio; I could not smell turps or white spirit; I could not see a Francis Bacon tsunami licking the prosaic off the … Read More
Did you ever do something good as a child only to be told stuff like “you’ll get your reward in Heaven”? No thanks, especially if a nun is on reward duty; it will be slim pickings for the protestants … Read More
“What is art, Herr Schwitters” “What isn’t?” This was my opening quote in the art history exam in 1973. Kurt, neatly summing up the conceptualist ideology of 1970s art schools. For all of its egalitarian symbolism, Kurt’s quote was embedded … Read More
In 2021 I was asked to contribute to an exhibition in Hereford. I researched the year 1971 for the painting ‘The anchorhold 1971’ I used a version of a toy theatre and painted anchorholds in the theatre boxes, women kept … Read More
My first imaginary friend was a bluebird, directly lifted from a favourite storybook, with the power of speech and flight, much needed in large families. Another was a baby although I had a baby sister. This imaginary one was … Read More
‘At the violet hour, the evening hour that strives Homeward, and brings the sailor home from sea, The typist home at teatime, clears her breakfast, lights Her stove, and lays out food in tins.’ On the 7th April I’ll … Read More
NICK’S GIFT Review by Paul Green Becky Nuttall’s first collection is a delight to read. The poems range from vivid but unsentimental epiphanies of a sixties childhood to powerful evocations of a seventies adolescence in all its … Read More
I inherited my father’s art school portfollio, letters written to his closest friend, poems, lists and journals. I have the lovely poems he wrote for me, his funny postcards and random letters. I have disposed of … Read More
“Momento mori – love, I love’
