Return to 2015 Contents Page

Talking with Mark Miles   (venue - The Library )

One of the newcomers to the 2015 Rochford Art Trail

Mark is a young man who surprised us. He works for a well-known High Street chain and does not convey the stereotype artist image. He is clearly in his early days but as you’ll see if you come along to the library (his venue) during the Trail, he has a vibrant style which grabs the attention. What is even more surprising, as you’ll see in the interview, he has had no training and belongs to no group where he gets input. He is a young man who stands on his own and therefore, will be someone well worth watching in the years to come. But let’s let him speak for himself:  

Introducing some of the newcomers to the Rochford Art Trail

Top of page

See more of Mark’s work here at Venue 13 page

Rochford Life: Mark, the leaflet has you down as an oil painter. Is that right or do you do more?

Mark:   That’s right, it is exclusively oils that I work in.

RL: So these round the room are examples of your oils?

Mark:  That’s right. A couple of them are works in progress which I hope to have finished for the trail, but the rest are finished ones.

RL: A question I tend to ask all newcomers to the Trail is how long have you been painting and have you had any training?

Mark:  I haven’t been trained as a painter or artist. I was always drawing when I was younger but I only picked up paints about six years ago and it’s gone from there. In the past couple of years I’ve been doing commissions. I’ve done quite a number in the past two years.

RL: Your work, and particularly the way you handle light seems so good; have you had any lessons or do you belong to a group?

Mark:  No to both. I’m self-taught and work from photos and copying and most of these paintings here are that. Lately I’ve been reading about composition and the use of colour techniques. It’s been my wife who has really inspired me to paint. As I said I used to draw but didn’t develop my talent and just drew for fun.

RL: Why oils?

Mark:  Well I tried acrylics at first but I felt they were too plastic for me and they dried out too quickly for me. Oils seem to stay wetter and I love the texture of working with them. I’ve dabbled with water colours but they are very unforgiving. I think oils work very well if you are trying to get a realistic feel to the work. As I said I often start with photographs but like one here, started with a photo and then found pictures of storms to incorporate in it.

RL: How long does it take you to produce a painting?

Mark:  Well, one here took about fifteen hours I suppose which is probably what most of them take, usually in sittings of say about three hours. Now I have started using a different technique. Painters often work directly from the palette to the canvas, but what the old Masters did was use glazes, semi-transparent layers so that’s what I’m trying to do with my latest one, adding a semi-transparent layer and add the colour and add a certain luminosity because the light travels through it. Doing that you can achieve colours that are impossible to get from just mixing colours on the palette because the colours mix optically on the canvas rather than on physically

RL: Wow! We’ll look forward to seeing the finished product on the Trail in a week or so. Mark, thank you for sharing. Enjoy finishing off your present work and we look forward to seeing more in the years to come.