ARTIST INTERVIEW: Frances Bell
Frances Bell
Tell me about yourself. What ignited the spark to become an artist?
I can’t say exactly when I decided that art was for me, but I would have been about 16. I grew up in rural Suffolk, surrounded by the outdoors and though my mother was an artist, it wasn’t part of our lives day to day, we were more likely to be outside as kids. So it was at school, along with my mother’s influence, when I thought about it as a possible career.
You studied in Florence at the Charles. H. Cecil Studios, what did you gain from this experience? How did your art develop during your time in Florence?
I really started to learn in Florence, for the first time, some rigorous foundations for drawing and portraiture. It’s an intense training and I hugely enjoyed it. Those foundations provide you with scope to move in whichever direction you might wish. The training acts as a foundation set of principles for your future work.
What is it that fascinates you about classical painting? Have you been influenced by any classical painters, if so who are they and why?
There are so many artists that I value, it would be hard to say which are most impressive to me. I love 17th century artists like Velazquez and Vandyck, but also 19th century ones such as Sorolla, Sargent and Zorn and Beaux. What I gain from looking at past painters is manifold - ranging from technique and materials, through to the underlying interests of subject that both separate and unite them. All of the artists I admire are concerned with simply the art of conveying a human essence into canvas. There are many ways to do this but the most proficient classical artists had an empathy combined with great craft.
How does observing in life help you establish the perfect composition? What do you believe you can achieve through painting this way, that you couldn’t by using a photograph?
If you separate yourself from the life subject, you’re automatically more impoverished for information. People move, they shift, they tend to give you information that you couldn’t anticipate, and you then incorporate. There are textures and colours that emerge through observation. I’m not anti-photography, it’s extremely useful but it’s not in and of itself complete enough to base an entire portrait on. If you can work from life as much as possible, a more human version of the sitter appears.
Do you communicate a lot with your sitters? Which features of the human face do you particularly enjoy painting? Are there any features that you find more challenging?
I don’t have a favourite feature, but I do talk a lot to my sitters. It’s related to my previous answer - you will get more humanity out of a sitter if you can communicate with them and paint them at the same time.
You are both a portrait and landscape artist, how does your process differ when painting each of these subjects? Out of both these areas of your work, which is your favourite to paint?
I do prefer portraits, but I’m hugely fond of landscape painting too. The approach is similar. It’s just a slightly different approach - you don’t have to relax the landscape and ask it questions!
Out of all your paint brushes, which is your favourite and why? What are the five tools that you would recommend any artist has in their studio?
I tend to use filberts, but also rounds and mongoose hair (or replacement) softer brushes. Sometimes square bristles.
I would have a large palette; it’s annoying to run out of space, a proper vertical easel, a mirror to use to assess your work in, music and a studio dog.
What is the best piece of advice you have been given as an artist?
Work from life.
Why do you think art is important in society?
Art is a society’s proof of life. We are lucky to live in an environment where a fundamentally inessential, but essentially human practice is cherished. In much of the world, even today, that would be impossible - society’s reward for democratic stability is thriving art, and art enriches society. I’m not saying that art is well paid, or that artists are always comfortable - certainly not in the current moment.
However, I do think we sometimes loose sight of how miraculous it is to confront a blank canvas having absorbed an elaborately difficult craft over years, and take time and space to create something which can then communicate independently to others. Surely this is the greatest oddity of our species and, however modestly in each instance, adds to our shared civilisation.
I hope, as AI and other forms of instant gratification come along, that we continue to cherish the tradition of representational art for the slow moving miracle that it is.
