Sam King’s practice explores the human condition on an individual and social level. Distorting the body to reveal our suppressed desires and repulsions, his work disrupts constructed notions of identity in order to trigger a primordial reconnection with the self. The resulting work deals with universal concepts of creation and destruction, being and non-being, fullness and nothingness.
King employs the chiaroscuro techniques of the Old Masters aimed to inspire veneration and awe. Yet unlike their notion of spirituality, conveyed by a divinely inspired, biographically coherent subject, he denies this agenda, rupturing the soundness of the figure. The result is a work that locates the transcendent within the indeterminate and contingent forms of the body.
Utilising creative and reductive techniques such as burning, scraping, dragging and cutting, King’s work transverses the boundary between painting and sculpture. His painting combines interplay of colour and monochrome to suggest different levels of presence, along with impasto technique to mimic the carnality of the body, generating an instinctual experience that conveys both sensuality and abjection. Confronting questions of being, spirituality, mortality and embodiment, he strips away physical boundaries of the body, to reveal it as the active site in which meaning is produced.
Self-taught or art school?
I attended The Art Academy London for my undergraduate, which had a highly focused atelier style approach to teaching that allowed me to gain significant technical knowledge in my oil painting. However, I believe the distinction between the two is less clear. We are always taking in knowledge and learning from many sources.
If you could own one work of art what would it be?
The Ambassadors by Holbein the Younger. The combination of a highly detailed, yet ‘normative’ scene and that anamorphic skull in this work is just so unnerving and surprising. It’s unbelievable that work was painted in the 1600s.
How would you describe your style?
If I had to name it, Figurative Surrealism. Although I often feel drawn to respond to varying ideas or issues, and hence this ‘style’ changes. I believe the appearance is merely a way to express the inner content; they should always align. I’m reminded of a quote from Merleau Ponty’s Phenomenology of Perception that artwork is “a being in which the expression is indistinguishable from the thing expressed”, and I think this is very true.
Can you tell us about your artistic process?
Along with classical oil painting technique, I use a variety of creative and destructive processes in my practice including impasto, burning, cutting and dragging to alter and change the figure and surface. I’m very interested in the idea of removal to achieve incomplete and transitory states.
Is narrative important within your work?
My work often draws upon the Old Masters use of narrative scenes, chiaroscuro and drama. However, I limit any specific historical or subjective identification through the distortion of the figures or portrait. Instead, my work deals directly with issues related to being: embodiment, mortality, time, consciousness. So yes, the narrative is important in the sense that I invert it. There is movement and bodily engagement, but no story or destination.
Who are your favourite artists and why?
I have many favourite artists from whom I have been inspired. Francis Bacon, Nicola Samori and Adrian Ghenie are some of the artists who’ve had the biggest impact on me. I’ve been lucky enough to see all of their works in the flesh.
What or who inspires your art?
My most important inspiration comes from philosophy and theory. I find it gives a basis to my work and allows me to think and conceptualise further than I previously. Particularly authors who write about the body and our relationships to the world, such as Merleau Ponty or Amelia Jones. Recently I’ve been reading Society of the Spectacle by Guy Debord, which speaks about the individual and social experience under late-capitalism.
Where’s your studio and what’s it like?
I’m currently in the process of moving studio, but will remain in London for the time being!
Do you have any studio rituals?
Atmospheric Music to help me to focus.
What are you working on currently?
I’ve been working on a series of paintings exploring the relationship between embodied and digital experience. Currently, I am attending a residency at PADA in Lisbon, Portugal for one month.
Where can we buy your art?
Most of my work is available directly from my studio. www.samkingart.com
