Cowboys, cowgirls, and Lloyd

Illustrator, lecturer and ukelele player Peter Lloyd reveals life as a creative academic. Did we mention David Bowie likes him? Yee-ha!

I studied Fine Art Printmaking, first at Winchester School of Art, then at post graduate level at the Royal College of Art. I came into education late, I’d always drawn and made images but I’d never seen it as a career choice so my first incarnation was as an apprentice heavy and structural sheet metal fabricator.

I think they’ve come a really long way in terms of quality and cost. I don’t compare digital to analogue, there’s far too much opportunity for them to complement than compete. I am working on a set of prints at the moment that are hand drawn, partially coloured digitally, screen printed onto then collaged. Each element has its own function and characteristic, the trick is to be able to recognise those characteristics and play them off against one another.

Listen to music, go for a bike ride, or the ultimate extravagance: travel (preferably at somebody else’s expense :))

I am not saying that I don’t find elements of what I do frustrating at times, but ultimately I fit everything in because I love what I do – whether it’s managing an art school, getting my head around a technical process, mixing with cowboys, or being manhandled by Kendo Nagasaki.

I recently had a show at Southampton Solent Showcase that featured four very large, full-length cowgirls, created using the mix of processes I described earlier. The show coincided with the graduation ceremony for the School of Art, Design & Fashion and at the event I was able to confer an honorary doctorate to Sir Peter Blake. I showed Sir Peter around the show prior to the ceremony and the cowgirls generated a really great conversation about popular culture, films, printing, elements of his past and the possibilities for my future. It was a really special, satisfying moment for me and it was magnified even further when he referred to me as one of his favourite graphic image-makers during his acceptance speech. I’ve been lucky enough to meet a few of my heroes, but nothing has compared to that meeting and it’s all generated and driven by making pictures. They get a life of their own and they can take you on wonderful, sometimes surreal and always rewarding journeys…

I’d like to be cheeky and choose three: Sir Peter Blake, for obvious reasons; Eileen Cooper, the first-ever woman to be made Keeper of the Royal Academy since its inception in 1786, and an inspirational artist, educator and supporter. And Jonny Hannah, the most tireless, driven and prolific image-maker I’ve ever met. I am very good friends with Jonny and I am lucky (and stupid enough) to be in a position where I can try to pace myself against him. It’s not possible, he’s a machine, but it gets the energy going!

I am with Marshal Macluan on that one – nothing ever dies in popular culture, at the very worst it can become retro. Print lives on, but it’s complemented now by many accessible opportunities to develop the 2D into the moving image. The future for illustration is extremely bright and it’s developing into a very broad church that embraces the analogue and the digital, the still image and the moving image.

Well, I’ve just launched a School of Art, Design & Fashion at Southampton Solent University, officially opened by guess who? Sir Peter Blake! I’ve just completed a piece of work for a group exhibition and publication called the ‘Rise and Fall of Mel Gibson’ (watch out for a potential submission from Tom Hardy) and I am working on a set of images that will celebrate the similarities and differences between the UK and Asia. That body of work will be exhibited at the Shanghai Institute of Technology in China where I am a visiting professor.

I would suggest that you split your chances and invest in the very reasonably priced works of Jonny Hannah, Chris Arran, Ceri Amphlett and Louise Weir.