With her art displayed in collections to watch, Joanna Kirk is an artist to watch
Joanna Kirk knew she was going to be an artist from a very young age.
“There was nothing else I was going to do, I never thought about doing anything else,” she says, talking from her bright and modern Blackheath home, as we look at her latest work, taking up nearly a whole wall, with mounds of pastels beside it.
“I was always drawing in my bedroom at home, I was always happy doing that. I never thought about doing anything else. There was no career decision: you either are or you aren’t an artist, it’s a compulsion.”
Joanna is one of the few contemporary artists working solely in pastel today. Attending Goldsmith’s College of Art, Joanna has had both solo and group exhibitions as far and wide as New York and Jacksonville in America, Prague, Milan, Antwerp, Amersfoort, Bregenz, Bremen, and Cologne in Europe, and Derby, Glasgow, Leeds, Llandudno, Manchester, Warwick, Sheffield, Norwich, Plymouth and Cambridge around the UK. She has had numerous London solo exhibitions, her last being at the prestigious Blain Southern Gallery in Mayfair, which also represents artists including the Chapman Brothers, Damien Hirst, Lucien Freud, Wim Wenders and Mat Collishaw.
In her work, Joanna explores themes such as motherhood, isolation, humanity, our complex relationship with nature, and intimacy. Her works are expansive, yet enveloping in their detail. Her works are meticulously constructed, and typically take weeks. Gradually building up the surface of each piece, she adds layer upon layer to produce compositionally rich and complex landscapes which become almost abstract in their surface detail. How would she describe her work to someone who does not know it?
“I would say that they are psychological landscapes. I’m not just interested in the landscape itself but what’s going on in the landscape, so they are open to interpretation, they are intuitive pieces. I go somewhere – Iceland, for example, where I did quite a big body of work – informed by the structural things I might see. Then I place someone in the landscape – perhaps my children, or it could be me.
“At the moment I am using a drone to take images from above, which seems a very exciting way of viewing the earth. You’re looking down, and it makes it more abstract and enigmatic.
“They are very intense large pieces using pastel. I’ve always loved drawing. There’s something about the pastel itself: its pure pigment, pure colour. The pictures are made up from layers and layers of pastel on board. I like working on a really large scale, it’s a bit more of an immersive piece, a bit more overwhelming. They take a long time, sometimes three or four months each piece. I work on one at a time.”
Joanna buys Schminke pastels from L. Cornelissen & Son, a traditional art supplies shop near the British Museum. It’s an apothecary-like shop that sells niche art materials and has been in business since 1855.
“The shop is staffed by working artists and we talk about what we’re working on. It’s part of my ritual: I go in and spend half an hour choosing colours, I love doing that.
“I have favourite colours. There’s this lovely blue made by a couple in France. With pastels, there’s a story behind each colour. Pastels have always been seen as inferior to paint. Drawing has always been seen as not the main event, just the preparation for the big canvas. Drawing with pastels was what aristocratic women did in the 17th century, like embroidery, something to keep them busy. But, in a way, using pastels is more direct, as drawing is not using a brush, it’s quite immediate. And it’s a hard medium to use.
Does she have favourite works?
“Normally the last piece I’ve done is my favourite piece,” she says. “But I’m happy they go out into the world. I’m not sentimental about them, the process of making them is the thing. I’m especially happy if they go to a good collection as I know they will be looked after. Having said that, making a piece means so much to me.”
The intensity of Joanna’s works comes from the amount of work put into each piece, and also the vivid colours. Adding to the intensity is the fact that each piece is extremely fragile, being paper mounted on board. One inadvertent swipe of the hand could wreck a piece.
Artists that have inspired her include Gustav Klimt, Toulouse Lautrec and Chris Ofili.
“There are so many artists that inspire. For example, Van Gogh’s work still seems terribly fresh and contemporary. I always go back to him colourwise, he’s unique.
“Odilon Redon is one of my favourite artists. In terms of pastels, he’s the one. There’s one of his in the National Gallery I go and see quite a lot. I just go in to see that and Van Gogh’s Two Crabs – it’s supposed to be symbolic of him and Gauguin.”
Artist Damien Hirst has a lot of Joanna’s pieces, and is one of her main collectors.
“They’re part of his Murderme collection. He’s been very supportive of my work. He was really instrumental in getting me out there. He just came along one day and bought some work. I was making work at home, but found after having children it was hard to get my work seen. He bought my work, did a book with me, put my work up in his boardroom. He’s been a brilliant support, very generous and kind. He totally understood where I was coming from.”
What inspires her?
“Things visually: walking in landscapes inspires me, for example – I grew up in the countryside. The vastness of nature is overwhelming and scary, I like to be reminded of that. Nature is so uncontrollable.
“Iceland I found particularly inspiring. It wasn’t a landscape I knew, it was erupting and moving all the time, like a sci-fi movie. Iceland is an amazing, tiny place. Outside the hotel was a lava field. You knew something dramatic was going on under the surface.
“In Iceland they all have art on their walls, they read all the time, they have voted on this gender equality thing – which isn’t going to happen here anytime soon – so I’m totally in love with Iceland. However, I can get inspiration anywhere. For example I recently went to Wales, to a waterfall, which will probably be a new work.
“Music inspires me. There’s a fantastic Icelandic composer I like, Jon Leifs, who named all these symphonies after things like volcanoes erupting. It’s classical, but sounds so contemporary and fresh.
“Things going on in my life inspire me, things from my childhood, my children, getting older.”
She has been with filmmaker Peter Bach since 1990.
“He has been so supportive of my work. As a female artist it’s hard unless you have massive support behind you.”
Joanna is especially interested in how female artists fit in in the art world.
“The art world was always sexist, and women remain under-represented in the art world, but it’s changing. Women have had to be forceful, and are now really showing their work. They’ve been left out but now it’s being realised they’ve been left out. But until we have more female art collectors things won’t change really radically.
“I think it’s great the younger generation of female artists are really supportive of each other. It’s nice seeing women supporting each others’ work. I’m always on the look-out for female artists, I need someone to relate to.
“I recently read the journals of sculptor Anne Truitt, about bringing up her children and making art at the same time. I’m really interested how you make art and bring up a family.
“I hate this idea about being a mother or having children affects your art in a negative way. It’s not the case, these experiences feed into your work.”
One great constant in her life is Greenwich and Blackheath.
“We ended up in Greenwich and then Blackheath. We like it here. The park is great. I’ve done pieces of work that comes from the park. Our children, Clara and Anders, go to Thomas Tallis, the best school on the planet. It’s a lovely, progressive school with great ideas. It’s always moving forward, and also very caring.”
“I do like the artist’s life. It never gets too solitary. I love being alone with my time and work – there’s actually no other place I’d rather be.”
This article appeared in the Spring 2018 issue of Black + Green Magazine