Portrait of a Daughter - Nick Cotton

This is a painting I did of my daughter at her breakfast when she was about ten. I have throughout my life nearly always enjoyed the process of making paintings and at times, in the distant past, I even considered it as a living.

My mother was very fond of telling stories of what I did and what I said when very young to whomever might care to listen . As we all have or have had a mother, you will be able to understand this. I could relate a number of embarrassing moments, especially for instance when I brought a girlfriend home for the first time, but, as this is about a painting I will save that for another day.

Having said that, I must relate just one anecdote which has nothing to do with painting and concerns the momentous occasion of my birth! I was fortunate to have a rather naughty and mischievous uncle who, visiting my mum just after I was born, announced ‘Good god, Gena, you have given birth to a gorilla’. I was allegedly covered from head to foot in dark hair.

This is probably my favourite and certainly the most oft repeated family anecdote competing with the family motto, “be careful, you’ll have someone’s eye out with that”. Like most mothers, she was very proud of her ‘little Nicky’ and told me numerous times - and anyone else who might listen for that matter - that my first sentence uttered was ‘tab and tenconk’, now not strictly a sentence but, translated, was a request for a pad and pencil. There is no doubt that drawing in particular has fascinated me since I can remember.

To sit in front of something and try to draw it or interpret it is the most revealing and rewarding way of seeing and understanding. As a language that communicates throughout the centuries, I believe it to be more effective than the written word can ever hope to achieve; I suppose the cave paintings produced at Lascaux are the best examples. I don’t hang my own paintings but for this one exception and it is something I see every day.

It is a good few years since I painted it and I can see a number of problems with it, but unlike a lot of my work, I’m not particularly embarrassed by it. I’ve been fortunate that I have sold a lot of paintings over the years, but very often I have painted with the intention of selling and to please others because I have needed the money.

In the late eighties and early nineties, I was taken on by a couple of galleries, one in Cardiff and another in Cheltenham and was given a one man show at both. The private view in Cardiff is memorable not for the amount of pictures I sold, but for my rather bizarre behaviour. I arrived at the gallery in plenty of time for the opening and there was my work hanging, along with nibbles and wine glasses and people running about for what appeared to be no apparent reason.

I was unexpectedly seized by total panic and looking at my efforts, felt the most acute embarrassment and self doubt. The rest is pretty much a blur although I remember spending the majority of the viewing locked in the toilet. Fortunately, I had sufficient presence of mind to take a bottle of wine with me. I have a vague recollection of encouraging words from the other side of the door, but all attempts to make me leave the safety of my cell fell on deaf ears.

The outcome was mixed, my work had sold well despite my absence but the gallery owner was not best pleased. Still, he kept me on the books and in fact the exhibition had yielded several commissions so he had little choice. I stayed with the gallery for a short time , but it was instrumental in my deciding that becoming a professional artist was not for me.

My final commission or the last one I accepted was to paint, for a lady client, her guinea pig. I have been fortunate to have been able to spend my life with artists, alive and dead and I’ve had privileged access to a number of our public galleries and museums to assist with exhibitions, even curating a couple. I have also been able to associate with some artists who have become household names and met with some incredible characters.

The advantage of having been on both sides of the counter is that hopefully, it has given me a much greater understanding of the frustrations, self doubt and sometimes secret despair of the serious painter, sculptor etc. I have hosted a good number of exhibitions in my gallery over the years and it has almost always been a pleasure. At the opening of any show, the sensation of uncertainty has never left me, along with that horrible fear that nothing will sell. You might think that that fear may have subsided, but no, there it is on every occasion.

Perhaps it’s a good thing and still as crucial as it ever was. Measuring the success of an artist is difficult, but for me the thing I have come to admire the most is the artist who refuses to compromise their work. I could list a good number but Hans Schwarz, Roger Large and Ian Cryer immediately come to mind because they are all very different characters and very different in their approach to painting, but share that one important attribute.

They have painted to please themselves and not to please others.

I have often heard flattering remarks about my work and of course that is nice to hear and also ‘you should have been a full time painter’. The problem with that is that when I was painting almost full time, I did constantly compromise my work, considering very carefully what might make a good picture with a specific appeal. I think I did that quite well, but there is little satisfaction in making something from a formula.

Sadly, I didn’t have the courage to let my creative processes lead me, and that is why I didn’t attempt it as a way of life, but I have been able to rub shoulders with those who could and can and that continues to give me great pleasure.

These posts have not been planned or even considered that much but are just recollections of the past and have proved to be somewhat cathartic. Well, there we are then! Another preamble, inspired by my daughter Jennie, this time eating a non existent breakfast for compositional purposes. I forget how much it cost me for this particular sitting but she has become a keen businesswoman so I guess it wasn’t cheap.

You can find out mnore about the Lynda Cotton Gallery here - http://www.thelyndacottongallery.co.uk/