Jonathan Hooper
Leeds, West Yorkshire, UK
Website
sites.google.com/site/jonathanmurrayhooper
Instagram
www.instagram.com/hooperpainter
How would you describe your work?
I make paintings of the buildings and places that surround me: the houses, shops and parks of Leeds. Most of my subjects are places I know very well - they are places within a thirty-minute walk of my home, places I walk through regularly and have done for many years.
I have two parallel purposes in these paintings: to make an image that conveys the character of the places I paint, and the real experience being in them; and to make paintings that stand on their own as arrangements of colour and paint.
What inspires you?
I am inspired by three things:
The landscape I live in, the suburban landscape of Leeds: houses like the one I live in, and those I have lived in; my local streets, shops and parks.
The emotional possibilities of colour in painting: I find colour and its harmonies and contrasts continually surprising and stimulating. For me it provides an element in painting that can represent the emotional and physical experience of being in a real place - those things which are missing from a photograph or a naturalistic image.
The work of painters of the past. I have been influenced by a lot of painters but they fall into two broad categories: colourists like Titian, Matisse and Rothko; and makers of quiet, reflective paintings like Vermeer, Corot and Morandi.
Can you speak about your process?
I find my subjects on my walks through the city, and I take photographs on my phone.
At home, I look through the photos, select possible subjects for paintings, crop the photos, and print them. I print them in black-and-white because I find the colour in photographs no help in the construction of an image - I find it better to use a mix of memory and imagination.
I make drawings in watercolour or gouache or ink from the photos, to develop composition and colour for the paintings. The colour comes partly from the subject itself - maybe some small aspect of it, or maybe a feeling about it - but there are also elements of improvisation, and of experiment within a narrow range.
The drawings are the basis for paintings in oil, on canvas or board. I work fairly small (from 20x25cm to 60x90cm), horizontally on a table in my studio at home. I use water-mixable oils, thinned with water to a fairly fluid consistency.
As I am working on the paintings, I continue to visit the subject each day, taking more photographs, and I make more watercolour drawings to work through problems in the paintings.
How did you become interested in art?
My grandfather was a talented amateur painter of landscapes. He taught me to paint in oil as well as watercolour and ink, and he introduced me to the work of many of the painters that I still look to - Vermeer, Sickert, Utrillo, Vlaminck. I loved painting as a boy, but gave it up at secondary school to pursue academic subjects.
I came back to art later as a hobby, until a visit to an exhibition in London where I saw one of Derain's rainbow-like paintings of the river Thames. It was a powerfully transforming experience: I realised what colour could be in painting, and I knew that the only thing I wanted to do was to paint. I went to evening classes where I was lucky to have a very good tutor, who encouraged me to apply to art college.
Do you have any favorite artists, movies, books, or quotes?
The best recent book on painting I've read is Christopher Neve's 'Unquiet Landscape' - a meditation on place in twentieth century British landscape painting. Neve is a painter himself, and knew many of the painters he discusses, and it is a very insightful book on the business of making paintings and the relationship between images and places.
One painter that I keep coming back to is Walter Sickert - he provides a bridge between nineteenth century French painting, and twentieth century British painters. I have been inspired by his immediate, everyday subject matter, his use of colour - sometimes bold, sometimes subdued - and his use of cropped photographs to generate compositions. And he wrote very well about painting too.
What advice do you have for younger artists? (optional)
Take time to experiment widely and deeply with your medium.
I am continually learning about colour - not as something abstract, or as numbers on a computer, but as physical stuff on a piece of cloth or wood. Two reds that look the same in the tube can behave completely differently when put on a surface, or mixed with another pigment.
Any more thoughts about art, creativity, or anything else you would like to share?
I know from my own experience how art can bring joy and ease trouble - I wish more people had the opportunity to paint, or to dance, act, or play a musical instrument. Unfortunately at the moment - in the UK at least - educational and financial pressures are making these things less accessible for many young people, which I think is a great shame.
