-Name: Oliver Lunn
-Born/Based: Born in Kent, based in London, UK.
-Making art since:
I’d say I’ve been making art on and off since I was a teenager in the early 2000s. I studied it at university and then took a detour through arts journalism before diving deep back into it about five years ago.
-Something you’d like our readers know about you:
I like to dance most days. Usually just for 2 or 3 songs by myself. I’m also currently logging my interactions with strangers in a journal, trying to speak to at least one stranger a day, which is surprisingly hard for me. I live with my wife and our cat George, who followed us home one night and decided to stay. I also love reading fiction, and have a soft spot for stories of lost worlds, dense jungles, castaways, and shipwrecks.
-What are three tools/elements you can’t work without?
Matte medium
China marker
A big pile of broken books and billboard elements
-What do you think is the most important thing that defines your work as yours?
Small details. I’ve become really interested in the idea of margins, and making the marginal the most important bit. So I like the small details and secrets that lurk around there, I like hiding bits of text and colours, I like things that peer around corners and edges, little surprises and rewards for the viewer when they look closer. I’m interested in creating a kind of intimacy there. I guess people would say I use a restricted colour palette too, although I think I use a lot of colour now haha.
-Can you describe your work process?
Firstly I collect a bunch of material, old books and torn posters found in the street, discarded pots of household paint. I’m lucky where I live in London that people are always discarding stuff like that. I basically build up layers and tear them down. There’s often a lot of destruction and erasure – sanding surfaces, tearing paper, peeling bits off to reveal other bits. There’s definitely a chance element to it, and I’m constantly making mistakes and then following those mistakes to somewhere unplanned.
A caveat to throw in here is that it’s all pretty intuitive and my process evolves and changes as I discover new things. Basically I hope I don’t get stuck in a single process.
-Which is the latest project/series/artwork that you had been working on?
So lately I’ve been working on my composition and the works look less monochrome. I feel like my earlier work was a bit anti-composition in a way, it sometimes lacked a focal point and was more about texture as I was inspired by walls and the urban environment.
I’ve also been getting back into drawing. So the new canvases look like defaced paintings as I’ve used oil bars and pastels on top of former layers. Then I tear bits off again or partially paint over the abstract drawings. I’m still using paper and paint as the foundation though.
-Which artists would you recommend us to check out?
Right now I’m really into Mark Bradford’s work, Hannelore Baron, Antoni Tàpies.
In terms of stuff I see on Instagram, I’ve really enjoyed recent work by Bram Braam (@bram.braam), Jack Felice (@jackfelice), Jenny Brosinski (@jenny_brosinski).
-What is your personal definition of collage?
A big part of it is getting out into the world, seeking out material, collecting fragments. Then it’s about finding interesting relationships between those elements, messing about, seeing how you can manipulate whatever you found in the street. But yeah, getting out, having an adventure, being curious about materials, and enjoying the constant looking.
Learn more about Oliver: Instagram. Website
