Brian Jull Biography
I had an affinity for drawing from a very young age. I
always had a pencil and paper ready to draw everything from animals to super
heroes & villains from the comic books that I collected with great enthusiasm. I
remember a TV show from America featuring an Artist/Detective who lived in a
house overlooking the sea, with his own private beach. At seven years old, I
thought this is
the life for me', apart from having to solve a mysterious crime
every week.
When I reached 15 I was ready to leave School and join an Art college, unfortunately nobody informed me that I was too young, and would have to wait until I was 16. I think this was the youngest they would consider at the time and this was a blow to my plans. An even bigger blow was when my elder Brother decided I should get a proper job and work with him as a floor layers labourer, although I am sure it was with good intentions as he did not believe I had any chance of becoming an Artist. I put my dreams on hold, went to work and never did get to college.
It was not until I was 21 years old and my first son was born that my ambition was rekindled by a visit to Bayswater Road in London. Here any Artist could exhibit & sell their work, you didn't need a Diploma just a modicum of raw talent could launch your career. After a day of selling all your paintings you would go home with pockets full of cash ready to paint some more for next week. But my wife was convinced enough to buy me an easel some brushes and oil paints, and now I had somebody who actually believed I could make it. My dream was back on course.
I decided in order to reach fulfilment as an Artist, that I should study the best art available to me, which was the Old Masters. Where I lived in Greenwich I was lucky enough to have the Maritime Museum which I could visit and study techniques of some great Masters as often as time allowed. I was also able to do sketches along by the river Thames.
As the years have gone by my influences have been very broad, not wanting to miss anything and certainly not dismiss any nuance of Art without seeing if it had anything useful to offer me for my ongoing progress in Artistic fulfilment.
My Technique has evolved from painting Photo Realism some years past, to the looser Impressionist style that I favour now, although the Realism does edge its way back if I think the subject requires. I try not to let it dominate the feel of the picture, making sure I leave something to the imagination of the viewer. I have painted in most mediums (oils, acrylics, watercolour, pastels etc) with oils being my main choice now and pastels for certain subjects that I feel require their unique quality.
Brushwork is important to me now in oils, whereas at one time I would get rid of all traces of the brush for the photographic look, I now want to express my character in the surface of the painting and make a more personal statement, that someone can take home with them when they buy a piece of my work. My ideas and inspiration now tend to come from sunlight, sometimes being softened and sprinkled by movement of leaves on the trees or reflected from water, and the way it completely transforms and changes the same scene from morning to midday to afternoon, it always surprises you with a different view and never seems to run out of ideas. Add to this the different seasons of the year and you could spend years just painting your own back garden, I have a feeling somebody has!
This is what makes me happy to paint and after years of soul searching and wondering what makes me tick and what profound message I should be conveying in my art, I realise that if I can project the feelings I have for a particular subject and convey this to an audience through my painting, I would feel I had been successful.
My day usually starts after two slices of toast and a mug of tea at 9.00 in my studio, a converted loft above a three bedroom house. It's a bit chaotic, I am not the organised type but seem to know where everything is, most of the time anyway!
I work from sketches and photographs that I have acquired over the summer months from travels abroad and the few days of sunshine in England. The sketches help me remember what it was like when I was there, the photographs are useful for detail, but as everybody knows when you get your precious holiday pictures back from the developers, they bear little resemblance to the beautiful place you have just visited, that's where my job begins to recapture the atmosphere that resides in the memory and put it on canvas.
Even though my B&W pastel work is greatly influenced by photography and is in a tighter style than my oils, I still have to reduce the irrelevant detail and compose the picture, to get across the right feeling I want to convey. Without colour the right balance is even more important.
I usually work through the day only stopping for mugs of tea at regular intervals ending the day around 6 or 7 o'clock, I like to leave my time flexible and not work to a clock, although a call from my wife that dinner is ready sometimes tells me its time to call it a day.
In the future I would like to have some one man exhibitions in England. So far I have had to travel to Sweden where I have had much success in various galleries from Gothenburg to Stockholm, and my paintings being collected by several Art Societies and banks. You never know my childhood dreams may still come true.