Junk Rock! The 7 greatest upcycled artworks ever

Regardless of what my ego might want to believe I always have more than one foot in the 'don't believe the hype' camp. However, it is still rather lovely to have had my work featured in the Nokia Connects article 'Junk Rock! The 7 Greatest Upcycled Artworks Ever', alongside works by such greats as Duchamp, Picasso, Tim Noble & Sue Webster, Erika Iris Simmons, Seo Young-Deok and Thomas Allen. The article was written by the talented writer/photographer Adam Monaghan and featured my Magnet sculpture, which is now in the permanent collection of the Black Gold Museum in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

The article was published quite some time ago and even though I featured a link to it in a previous blog post, the original piece sadly went the way of many online articles and disappeared from the internet. Fortunately I managed to find the original text and have decided to repost it here. I don't recall the exact photos used in the original article so I've made my own selection of artwork images by the featured artists, and presented them here. 

Junk rock! The 7 greatest upcycled artworks ever

In our environmentally concerned world it is perhaps not surprising to find art works made of ‘junk’, ‘scrap’ or ‘re-used’ products. And as recycling has, quite rightly, become a normal part of life rather than a weird niche activity, artists too have embraced pre-owned objects.

But art and scrap have a long history. So here’s a couple of recycled classics and a few new additions, which we think warrant a place on the all-time list of the greatest upcycled artworks ever.

Marcel Duchamp

Back in 1913, Marcel Duchamp changed the art world forever. He began working on the idea of ‘Readymades’ – objects selected from the world rather than actually made by an artist. Having it’s antecedents in Dada and the notion of ‘anti-art’ Duchamp’s work was often tinged with humour, such as the snow shovel entitled ‘In Advance of the Broken Arm’ (1915). His work, ‘Fountain’ (1917) is perhaps the most famous ‘Readymade’: a normal, everyday urinal, signed ‘R.Mutt’ and turned upside down.

 

Pablo Picasso

Turning junk into art and out-Duchamping-Duchamp in one fail swoop. Picasso’s ‘Bull’s Head’ (1942) is a masterfully simple juxtaposition. Its brilliance lies partially in the fact that it is instantaneously and simultaneously recognisable as both bike saddle and handlebars and as a bull’s head.

Picasso’s residency in Paris throughout World War II was of great moral and symbolic significance. And this work should not only be seen as art world one-upmanship but as brave (and also humorous) defiance of the Occupation.

 

Tim Noble and Sue Webster

Rising to stardom on the tide of the thriving British art scene in the mid-1990s, Tim Noble and Sue Webster turn rubbish into something elegant and ingenious. In a typical shadow work, a single light source illuminates the seemingly random pile of rubbish and casts a perfect silhouette of the artists on the wall behind. The rubbish itself is often linked to the artists, such as in ‘Dirty White Trash (with Gulls)’ (1998), which is sculpted out of six months of the artists’ domestic waste. Funny, poignant and surprising… what more could you ask for?

 

Wayne Chisnall

Wayne Chisnall is one of those annoying artists who seems at home in whichever medium he chooses to work in, from stunning draughtsmanship to witty sculptures. A great deal of Chisnall’s work uses found materials, be it wood, books, dissembled scientific equipment or discarded toys. An ever expanding list of impressive exhibitions and a growing presence on the London art scene means Chisnall is certainly one to keep an eye on over the next few years.

 

Erika Iris Simmons 

Erika Iris Simmons specialises in recycling old books, cassettes, playing cards and magazines. Her popular series, ‘Ghost in the Machine’, features portraits of musicians made from old cassette tapes. Simmons says of her work, “I don’t really add any paint or pigments… I usually just take things apart and re-arrange the pieces, cutting away portions when necessary… One day as I was leaving to go to work I saw a pile of cassette tapes laying on top of a canvas I had set near my door. I thought, “What ghosts could be hiding in those machines?” I pulled out the ribbon and tried to work with it, making some writing. I watched the ribbon curl up and it reminded me of Jimi Hendrix’s crazy hair, so that was the first portrait I made.”

 

Seo Young-Deok

Korean artist Seo Young-Deok is a sculptor who graduated from the Environmental Sculpture programme at the University of Seoul.  His works are made from – literally – miles of bicycle chains, carefully welded together to crate bodily forms and heads. His large sculpted head, which stands over two metres tall took over a year to build and is made of both recycled and new bike chains. Seo Young-Deok says that he finds inspiration in many places, from construction sites to the bustling Korean markets to traditional Buddhist sculptures.

Thomas Allen

To be honest, Thomas Allen is quite simply one of my favourite artists. Upon first seeing his work, I was completely taken aback and immediately in love with them. Funny, clever, cheeky and perfectly constructed; they stood out in an art world full of tired and unoriginal ideas and dull conceptualism run wild. By carefully cutting out the figures from pulp novels of the 1940s and 50s, then expertly lighting and re-photographing them, Allen has given these books and their implied narratives a new lease of life. A simple idea that simply works perfectly.

Kraken Attack

One of the many things that my lovely partner Marie Bertin and I have in common is our love of octopuses, especially those giant ones of nautical mythology that were said to attack sailing ships in attempts to drag them down to the ocean deep. Marie also makes small, often origami-inspired, jewellery and sculptural pieces from paper so I thought I’d make her this three dimensional decoupage painting on paper (well, on thick mount card to be precise).

 

'Kraken Attack', 2023, acrylic decoupage painting by Wayne Chisnall

The finished piece you see here is actually the inner box section before the glass and outer frame were added. I photographed it without the frame so as not to get reflections from the glass.

 

'Kraken Attack', 2023, acrylic decoupage painting by Wayne Chisnall

As you can see from the photos I made this small piece by painting it in four separate elements and cutting them out by hand, before assembling them as a 3D decoupage. Cutting the elements out with a scalpel proved both fiddley and time consuming so I’m glad I went for a modern take on the sea monster legend, and didn’t go with an old time sailing vessel with lots of sails and fiddley rigging to cut out.

 

'Kraken Attack (work-in-progress)', 2023, acrylic decoupage painting by Wayne Chisnall

I was partly inspired by a memory of those old theatre sets where they have multiple layers of cut-out depictions of water than are moved back and forth on stage to the give the impression of lapping waves, moving on the ocean’s surface. Although, to be more precise, it’ll be my memories of movie and TV depictions of those stage sets.

 

'Kraken Attack (work-in-progress)', 2023, acrylic decoupage painting by Wayne Chisnall

'Kraken Attack (work-in-progress)', 2023, acrylic decoupage painting by Wayne Chisnall

Retro Post - A Cringeworthy Christmas

 This is a reposting of an article that I wrote some years ago, and pertains to an embarrassingly awkward situation that I got myself into one Christmas. It's also about one of those regrettable memories that I just can't shake, so I thought it best to open old wounds, and share it with you one more time. Enjoy... 

 

A few years ago when I was working for a well known London gallery, a colleague asked me if I knew of anyone that would be interested in earning a bit of extra cash over the festive season doing caricatures at a Christmas party in The City (London) for some big corporation. The job was very well paid, involved a couple of hours of work drawing caricatures of the company's employees - and more free food and drink than any poor starving artist could wish for.

Well... what could I say but 'look no further - here's your man!'

I got the job and being overly confident in the fact that I'd always been pretty good at caricatures at school (they'd got me in and out of trouble with both pupils and teachers alike on more than one occasion) I did no more preparation than buying myself a new set of Tomboy brush pens and turning up at the venue.

At first, everything seemed to be going well. I was introduced to a hip-looking young man and woman who handed me my wages for the night (good start). They both looked super stylish. She had a cool bob (similar to Uma Thurman's in Pulp Fiction) and he was slightly camp and incredibly well turned out. So when they asked to be the first couple to be drawn I had no problems. I quickly rendered them in a minimal, sharp cartoon style that suited their look and everyone was happy.

Then everything seemed to go down hill from that point onwards. Unfortunately the next subject wasn't so aesthetically well rounded and feeling that their true essence wouldn't be captured using the previous style, I changed tack. Instead of creating a fun stylised cartoon version of my new subject I honed in on, and exaggerated, my hapless victim worst features. It wasn't an intentional act of malice. I had merely focused on the most prominent features and run with them – not thinking how the eventual image may turn out. Needless to say, it didn't turn out well – at least not for the subject. They weren't too pleased. I'd even go as far as saying that they may have been a little upset.

I quickly realised my mistake. I had failed to fix on one style, practice it beforehand and stick with it regardless.

By this point I was starting to feel a bit uncomfortable – which didn't help when it came to the next subject. Desperate to salvage the situation I tried yet another style but the only problem with this was that unless I stuck with my tried and tested methods there was the chance that the drawing would pay little resemblance to the person in front of me so I soon reverted back to knocking out grotesque renderings from the now large line of people forming next to me.

It was a very strange experience. I seemed to be upsetting an ever-growing number of people yet more of them were queuing up to be humiliated. And the more I tried to alter my style of drawing the worse these sketched monsters turned out (this may have been something to do with the vast number of drinks people were plying me with – which I was eager to consume in an attempt to dull the anxiety).

Not only was there a long queue of people waiting to be sketched but a large group had formed of slightly drunk folks who were obviously enjoying their fellow employees' visual assassinations (at this point I honestly no longer felt in control of what my hands were producing) - so much so that splinter groups were now breaking off from the main mob in search of juicier victims. A couple of them dragged over a lady who must have been the largest person in the whole company. I think that the alarm in my eyes must have mirrored that in hers. My mind was screaming 'please – not her!' but my fingers showed no mercy. One poor chap, after I handed him my rendition of him, simply looked at me with such devastation in his eyes and said 'I'm gonna go home now and hang myself'. I truly believe he didn't really mean it and it was just the drink talking but it obviously didn't ease my conscience.

After two of the longest hours of my life I apologised to the long line of people still waiting to be drawn (I should really have apologised to the ones I'd already sketched) and made my escape. I tell you – once outside of that building, London's air had never before smelt so fresh and the sense of relief never so palpable. I probably won't be doing that again - probably!

Mandalorian Tim

Likenesses aren’t exactly my forte but I will say that I’m quite pleased with this one. It’s of one of my oldest friend’s, Tim Henrick (so unless you know him, you’ll have to take my word for it that the likeness is pretty good). Tim recently turned 55, so for his birthday I thought I’d attempt to make him something special – after all, apart from socks or throwaway joke presents what do you buy for middle aged blokes? As it happens, Tim is a big sci-fi fan, and knowing that he liked the Star Wars series, The Mandalorian, I made this very small acrylic painting (painted with the smallest/finest brush I possess) of him as the Mandalorian character, leaning beside the beloved Baby Yoda/Din Grogu character.

 

'Tim as The Mandalorian', 2023, small acrylic painting by Wayne Chisnall

I thought I’d include some work-in-progress shots to show how I actually painted this small piece. I approached it akin to one of my illustration styles (mostly painting in one small section at a time until the entire surface has been filled) than say, one of my fine art oil painting styles, where I might apply paint at almost random points across the canvas's surface until the image emerges and I decide that the work has reached completion (or a reasonable/aesthetically pleasing point of abandonment).

 

'Tim as The Mandalorian (work-in-progress)', 2023, acrylic painting by Wayne Chisnall

You might have noticed a bit of graffiti, ‘Livvy woz ere’, painted on the wall behind Mandalorian Tim’s right shoulder. This is because Tim’s daughter is called Vivvy and I thought it fun to include her in the piece somehow.

 

You might have also noticed that I signed the painting ‘Chig’. This is something I rarely do anymore, but as most of my old friends still know me by my nickname, and this is how I used to sign my work back in the 80s and 90s when I was a magazine illustrator, I thought it appropriate to sign it this way in this instance.