| I was born in
England UK in the year of 1958
From an early age I wanted to be an artist.
I trained at St Martins School of Art but it was not until
I set up my own gallery in
London, The Coventry Gallery that my work developed in subject and style
recognizable today. It is at this point that my interest in erotica and
religious questioning seriously began. Through exhibitions of artists’
work, including my own, I explored sex and sexuality which climaxed with
two festivals of erotica, “Pleasures Unbound” 1995 and “Pleasures Unbound
– again” 1996. “Pleasures Unbound” was a finalist at the Erotic Oscars. As
was an earlier exhibition “Just Filth”.
A second and more influential beginning during the same
period was the inauguration of the UK’s only Erotic Life-Drawing Group
that I started in 1995. Sexuality was explored in all its forms. This
gained the attention of the media especially television which has featured
my drawing classes and my artwork many times. The classes were devoted an
entire chapter in a lovely book, “Sylvie Jones Sex Diary”.
A more recent and very successful venture was the creation
of The Association of Erotic Artists in 2005 co-founded with the widely
published photographer Christopher John Ball. The Association is running
strongly today and gaining a great deal of respect and attention.
Very recently I have moved to the South West of
France in order to further develop my artwork. I am currently preparing for
my first exhibition in
France.
My erotic works have been rarely exhibited for the past few
years.
Today I live in south west France a sleepy little vilage close to the stunning
Pyrenees mountains
An exploration
of the nude figure and of the eroticism inherent within the sex act in its
many forms, is at the heart of my work.
This has been a
personal journey for some eighteen years with increasingly the addition of
religious motifs within the context of the erotic. This permits me to
explore my response to the often dubious ideas about modern living forced
upon us by do-gooders and dangerous religious groups.
If I have taken
Picasso’s nudes as inspiration it has been in order to reconstruct the
nude in ways that enable a new configuration of the erotic.
Stefan Prince
has written:
”Paul's very
personal approach to life drawing is to render the figure from
multi-viewpoints thus revealing details that would otherwise be hidden
from a single view-point. Details are revealed through transparent
superimposition of body elements leading to exciting distortions of the
figure in a method Paul refers to as morphic cubism. Coupled with
these distortions Paul offsets subtle tonal ranges created through
delicate hatch and cross hatching against strong contrasts of light and
shadow. The result is a richly coloured series of powerful and disturbing
images exploring the beauty and sexuality of the human form.”
Studied
at
St
Martins School of Art – London 1976 – 1979
Exhibitions:
Gallery 47, London (1992)
B.P. Portrait Award, National Portrait Gallery, London (1994)
Gallerie
T’Hoff du Puttens – Belgium (1995)
Just
Filth!, Coventry Gallery (1995)
Pleasures
Unbound Festival of Erotica, Coventry Gallery (1995)
-
Finalist in the 1996 Erotic Oscars
Pleasures
Unbound Again, Coventry Gallery (1996)
Sex in Art, Coventry Gallery – London (1996)
Association of
Erotic Artists Group Exhibition, Woburn Gallery, London 2004
Club Wicked, (cabaret exhibitions), London
Deep Space Art Show, London
Erotica, Olympia, London (1999-2005)
Skin Two Expo 1999: ICA, London
Skin Two Expo 2000: Barbican, London
Skin Two Expo 2002: Barbican, London
International erotisk
samtidskunst II, Odense,
Denmark
(2008)
International erotisk
samtidskunst II, Aarhs,
Denmark
(2008)
Mairie, Castelnau-Magnoac, France (2008)
Erotic Heritage Museum, Las Vegas, United States (2008)
Office
de Tourism, Mirande, France 2008
Christmas Exhibition, Galleri Jarsbo, Denmark (2008)
www.art2b.co.uk
www.associationoferoticartists.com
i
Paul is on the panel of judges for a
prestigious international photographic competion (2009)
paul@art2b.co.uk |