Graham Knuttel
01 August 2007 Filed in: Miscellaneous
“I’m sure we have met before,” says Graham Knuttel as he opens the door of his restored Georgian house in central Dublin. It is not just a standard opening gambit either. Both of us are quite certain that our paths have crossed at some stage in the past, but try as we might a firm memory of it remains elusive. The banter back and forth is easy and unforced, with the odd ribald suggestion thrown in from either side to spice things up a bit. I had been warned that Knuttel could be a prickly interview subject but the casual ease of our conversation belied that opinion. For the next hour or so the talk wandered this way and that, skipping over a host of varied subjects, pausing at times to delve a bit deeper before swooping on to the next topic. Keeping it on any sort of structured path, following a pre-determined set of questions, was definitely not on the agenda.
Graham Knuttel was born in Dublin in 1954. His parents arrived in Ireland from England in 1947, nearly 30 years after his father’s family had moved there from Germany. One of his earliest memories is of spending endless hours drawing on note pads with what was then the new-fangled writing wonder of the age, a Bic biro. “I used to spends days and weeks drawing battle scenes, that was my thing. I had no interest in sport or anything like that. My only interest was drawing and painting. My brother had been to art school and my father didn’t want me to go to art school, so what I did was I failed all my exams so there was nothing else I could do.” Elsewhere, in a biographical essay, he has written: “My school days were not those of a model student. In fact, few of them were spent at school at all.” At the age of 18 he enrolled in the Dun Laoghaire Art School, “which was just starting out at the time so it was very fresh, there was a lot of energy out there.”
He loved the milieu of art school and found himself gravitating towards the life drawing room where he set about honing his skills as a figurative painter. He had little interest in abstract art and hence found himself in something of a dilemma when, in his final year, some new tutors who were disciples of abstract impressionism began to exert a commanding influence over the school. “I found it pragmatic therefore to stop painting temporarily and adjourn to the sculpture department for my final year.” Knuttel graduated in 1976 having created a series of moving wooden sculptures and machines that were reminiscent of medieval times. He had perhaps found his true calling in the world of art but times were tough: “I couldn’t afford to do sculpture. In art school you have got everything and when you leave you haven’t even got a hammer and a chisel… and you have nowhere to do it… The only thing I could afford to do was drawing.” Much more recently the wheel has come full circle again and Knuttel is now devoting an increasing amount of time to sculpture. As he puts it succinctly, “It interests me the most.”
The intervening three decades were something of a roller coaster, the first one of which was spent largely in London where he managed to eke out a precarious living. The bohemian lifestyle was attractive and little thought was given to developing a career as an artist: “I suppose when you are young a living is the price of a pint. You don’t really think about it. But I knew I wouldn’t make a living at anything else.” Things changed in 1987, however, when, in an almost damascene conversion, he changed overnight from being a rather directionless young artist into one with drive and commitment. (“I suppose I just grew up.”) The feckless approach to life was dropped in favour of something altogether more disciplined and motivated. Work, from dawn to dusk on many days, became the guiding principle.
In retrospect his timing proved impeccable, for Ireland, as an economic entity, was finally about to get its act together. The early years of the 1980s had been dismal (as evidenced by the stampede for Morrison visas to the United States) but by decade’s end change was in the air. Morale was boosted by things such as Stephen Roche’s victory in the Tour de France. The Celtic Tiger was about to flex its muscles and bare its claws and, as Knuttel puts it: “People were starting to buy paintings. You could make a living and you could afford to go and buy paints.” He was now on a roller coaster of another sort, as his distinctive and immediately recognisable paintings became well known and sought after. He is reflective when asked how the rampant economic prosperity has impacted on his work as an artist and whether the change has all been for the better: “It’s a mixture of better and worse. It’s changed completely now. Fifteen years ago there were three or four art galleries in Dublin and that was it. Now, for artists, art galleries are nearly irrelevant. They are all going to auction houses. Fifteen years ago an auction house never wrote to you and asked you for some work for their auction, now you get a letter from every auction house every week.” On the surface, such a state of affairs may appear to be an artist’s idea of nirvana but Knuttel sees a flip side to the coin also: “I think it is probably not so good for the galleries, which is probably not the best thing that could happen. Galleries look after the artist rather than auction houses… you only see them when you drop your work in and that’s it.” So has his own style of painting been influenced in any way by the success of the Celtic Tiger? “I suppose the characters in the paintings are better dressed.”
Greater financial stability enabled him to buy, in 1994, the Georgian house in which he still lives and works. A huge amount of meticulous restoration work was required including a new roof, plasterwork, stairs and floorboards. These latter are now scattered with a host of rugs made by The Dixon Carpet Company (formerly V’Soske Joyce) to designs by Knuttel. The colours are fabulously vivid – fiery scarlets, canary yellows and electric blues vie for your attention. It feels almost like a crime to stand on them, though the sumptuous pile makes you think you are walking on air. Most are surely destined to be hung on proud owners’ walls though Knuttel doesn’t mind if they are used as carpets, adding the caveat that none of them “would last 10 minutes as a carpet in my house.”
What certainly won’t be used as carpets are the stunning Aubusson tapestries that Knuttel has been working on in recent years. They are very much collaborative works and he has spent a great deal of time liaising with the tapestry house of Pinton, who have been in business now for some five centuries, to ensure that the finished articles are exactly as he conceived them in the first place. His signature use of strong colours and bold images has been found to be particularly suitable for tapestries. When asked to compare the tapestry and rug making processes he says: “They are completely different. The tapestry is hand woven with very, very thin thread, so there is an incredible amount of detail compared with a rug which is tufted. And you can mix things like silk for different effects.” There is also an element of risk attached to the production of a tapestry: “It’s woven in such a way that the weaver only sees a square inch, or that sort of size, of it at a time. It would take three weavers sitting beside each other maybe three months [to weave one of mine]. If there is a mistake in it you are ****** because they cannot see the finished thing until the very last stitch.” He likes both media for different reasons: “I find the rugs more immediate and the tapestries more subtle.” One senses, however, that the tapestries ultimately give him more satisfaction, thanks to the greater degree of detail and the simple fact that a straight line is not really feasible on a rug because it comes out zig-zag. Perhaps also the slight element of gamble attaching to the production of a tapestry adds an edge to the creative process: “With the tapestries you are taking a much bigger gamble because whether somebody buys it or not you still have to pay for it and it is a really expensive process.”
Sitting apart, aloof even, from us as we speak, in an alcove at the back of his studio, is one of Knuttel’s most striking creations, the elaborate chess set that he made in collaboration with renowned furniture designer and manufacturer David Linley. Knuttel recalls a time back in 1984 when he was living on the New King’s Road in London directly opposite Linley’s workshop, though it was to be another two decades before the two came together to work on this project. They were introduced through fashion designer Louise Kennedy and the result is a masterpiece of the furniture maker’s art, topped off by a set of beautifully crafted figures. The table is solid and foursquare, supported by a tapered column on a walnut base and the chessboard itself is done in marquetry. The ‘white’ pieces are solid silver and the ‘black’ are bronze and an extraordinary amount of detailed work went into their creation. An imperious king, a haughty queen, an ascetic bishop, an equine knight and a cylindrical rook stand behind a line of peak-capped pawns. It took 20 weeks to make each set and a limited edition of 12 boards and pieces was made. The anecdote that Knuttel loves to relate about the whole project concerns the time when the first board and pieces were put on display in Linley’s workshop in London. One of the silver pawns disappeared, never to be seen again, and the remainder had to be melted down and re-cast with a new pawn. The reason that a whole new set had to be made was because the pieces were assayed and certified as just that, a set, and the only way to preserve that integrity was to start again from scratch. Better news came in the form of the €150,000 that was paid for one of the chessboards at a charity auction to benefit Toothfairy. Nice move, that.
A KNUTTEL PRIMER
Born: Dublin, 1954.
Lives: Divides his time between Dublin and Barcelona.
Best known for: Vividly coloured paintings often featuring vaguely sinister characters in a cartoon style. They glance pointedly in a sideways fashion at one another and sport large, dramatic eyes “to connect the figures.”
Should be better known for: His sculptures, which are splendidly evocative pieces, meticulously crafted and full of vigour and life. His work really come alive when rendered in three dimensions rather than two.
Likes reading: Biography and true crime. Also manages to get through five newspapers a day.
Likes going to: Shelbourne Park for the greyhound racing.
Never seen without: A roll your own cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth where it enjoys semi-permanent residential status.
Article originally published in Cara Magazine, July 2007
Graham Knuttel was born in Dublin in 1954. His parents arrived in Ireland from England in 1947, nearly 30 years after his father’s family had moved there from Germany. One of his earliest memories is of spending endless hours drawing on note pads with what was then the new-fangled writing wonder of the age, a Bic biro. “I used to spends days and weeks drawing battle scenes, that was my thing. I had no interest in sport or anything like that. My only interest was drawing and painting. My brother had been to art school and my father didn’t want me to go to art school, so what I did was I failed all my exams so there was nothing else I could do.” Elsewhere, in a biographical essay, he has written: “My school days were not those of a model student. In fact, few of them were spent at school at all.” At the age of 18 he enrolled in the Dun Laoghaire Art School, “which was just starting out at the time so it was very fresh, there was a lot of energy out there.”
He loved the milieu of art school and found himself gravitating towards the life drawing room where he set about honing his skills as a figurative painter. He had little interest in abstract art and hence found himself in something of a dilemma when, in his final year, some new tutors who were disciples of abstract impressionism began to exert a commanding influence over the school. “I found it pragmatic therefore to stop painting temporarily and adjourn to the sculpture department for my final year.” Knuttel graduated in 1976 having created a series of moving wooden sculptures and machines that were reminiscent of medieval times. He had perhaps found his true calling in the world of art but times were tough: “I couldn’t afford to do sculpture. In art school you have got everything and when you leave you haven’t even got a hammer and a chisel… and you have nowhere to do it… The only thing I could afford to do was drawing.” Much more recently the wheel has come full circle again and Knuttel is now devoting an increasing amount of time to sculpture. As he puts it succinctly, “It interests me the most.”
The intervening three decades were something of a roller coaster, the first one of which was spent largely in London where he managed to eke out a precarious living. The bohemian lifestyle was attractive and little thought was given to developing a career as an artist: “I suppose when you are young a living is the price of a pint. You don’t really think about it. But I knew I wouldn’t make a living at anything else.” Things changed in 1987, however, when, in an almost damascene conversion, he changed overnight from being a rather directionless young artist into one with drive and commitment. (“I suppose I just grew up.”) The feckless approach to life was dropped in favour of something altogether more disciplined and motivated. Work, from dawn to dusk on many days, became the guiding principle.
In retrospect his timing proved impeccable, for Ireland, as an economic entity, was finally about to get its act together. The early years of the 1980s had been dismal (as evidenced by the stampede for Morrison visas to the United States) but by decade’s end change was in the air. Morale was boosted by things such as Stephen Roche’s victory in the Tour de France. The Celtic Tiger was about to flex its muscles and bare its claws and, as Knuttel puts it: “People were starting to buy paintings. You could make a living and you could afford to go and buy paints.” He was now on a roller coaster of another sort, as his distinctive and immediately recognisable paintings became well known and sought after. He is reflective when asked how the rampant economic prosperity has impacted on his work as an artist and whether the change has all been for the better: “It’s a mixture of better and worse. It’s changed completely now. Fifteen years ago there were three or four art galleries in Dublin and that was it. Now, for artists, art galleries are nearly irrelevant. They are all going to auction houses. Fifteen years ago an auction house never wrote to you and asked you for some work for their auction, now you get a letter from every auction house every week.” On the surface, such a state of affairs may appear to be an artist’s idea of nirvana but Knuttel sees a flip side to the coin also: “I think it is probably not so good for the galleries, which is probably not the best thing that could happen. Galleries look after the artist rather than auction houses… you only see them when you drop your work in and that’s it.” So has his own style of painting been influenced in any way by the success of the Celtic Tiger? “I suppose the characters in the paintings are better dressed.”
Greater financial stability enabled him to buy, in 1994, the Georgian house in which he still lives and works. A huge amount of meticulous restoration work was required including a new roof, plasterwork, stairs and floorboards. These latter are now scattered with a host of rugs made by The Dixon Carpet Company (formerly V’Soske Joyce) to designs by Knuttel. The colours are fabulously vivid – fiery scarlets, canary yellows and electric blues vie for your attention. It feels almost like a crime to stand on them, though the sumptuous pile makes you think you are walking on air. Most are surely destined to be hung on proud owners’ walls though Knuttel doesn’t mind if they are used as carpets, adding the caveat that none of them “would last 10 minutes as a carpet in my house.”
What certainly won’t be used as carpets are the stunning Aubusson tapestries that Knuttel has been working on in recent years. They are very much collaborative works and he has spent a great deal of time liaising with the tapestry house of Pinton, who have been in business now for some five centuries, to ensure that the finished articles are exactly as he conceived them in the first place. His signature use of strong colours and bold images has been found to be particularly suitable for tapestries. When asked to compare the tapestry and rug making processes he says: “They are completely different. The tapestry is hand woven with very, very thin thread, so there is an incredible amount of detail compared with a rug which is tufted. And you can mix things like silk for different effects.” There is also an element of risk attached to the production of a tapestry: “It’s woven in such a way that the weaver only sees a square inch, or that sort of size, of it at a time. It would take three weavers sitting beside each other maybe three months [to weave one of mine]. If there is a mistake in it you are ****** because they cannot see the finished thing until the very last stitch.” He likes both media for different reasons: “I find the rugs more immediate and the tapestries more subtle.” One senses, however, that the tapestries ultimately give him more satisfaction, thanks to the greater degree of detail and the simple fact that a straight line is not really feasible on a rug because it comes out zig-zag. Perhaps also the slight element of gamble attaching to the production of a tapestry adds an edge to the creative process: “With the tapestries you are taking a much bigger gamble because whether somebody buys it or not you still have to pay for it and it is a really expensive process.”
Sitting apart, aloof even, from us as we speak, in an alcove at the back of his studio, is one of Knuttel’s most striking creations, the elaborate chess set that he made in collaboration with renowned furniture designer and manufacturer David Linley. Knuttel recalls a time back in 1984 when he was living on the New King’s Road in London directly opposite Linley’s workshop, though it was to be another two decades before the two came together to work on this project. They were introduced through fashion designer Louise Kennedy and the result is a masterpiece of the furniture maker’s art, topped off by a set of beautifully crafted figures. The table is solid and foursquare, supported by a tapered column on a walnut base and the chessboard itself is done in marquetry. The ‘white’ pieces are solid silver and the ‘black’ are bronze and an extraordinary amount of detailed work went into their creation. An imperious king, a haughty queen, an ascetic bishop, an equine knight and a cylindrical rook stand behind a line of peak-capped pawns. It took 20 weeks to make each set and a limited edition of 12 boards and pieces was made. The anecdote that Knuttel loves to relate about the whole project concerns the time when the first board and pieces were put on display in Linley’s workshop in London. One of the silver pawns disappeared, never to be seen again, and the remainder had to be melted down and re-cast with a new pawn. The reason that a whole new set had to be made was because the pieces were assayed and certified as just that, a set, and the only way to preserve that integrity was to start again from scratch. Better news came in the form of the €150,000 that was paid for one of the chessboards at a charity auction to benefit Toothfairy. Nice move, that.
A KNUTTEL PRIMER
Born: Dublin, 1954.
Lives: Divides his time between Dublin and Barcelona.
Best known for: Vividly coloured paintings often featuring vaguely sinister characters in a cartoon style. They glance pointedly in a sideways fashion at one another and sport large, dramatic eyes “to connect the figures.”
Should be better known for: His sculptures, which are splendidly evocative pieces, meticulously crafted and full of vigour and life. His work really come alive when rendered in three dimensions rather than two.
Likes reading: Biography and true crime. Also manages to get through five newspapers a day.
Likes going to: Shelbourne Park for the greyhound racing.
Never seen without: A roll your own cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth where it enjoys semi-permanent residential status.
Article originally published in Cara Magazine, July 2007
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