}
Andrew Dick
By Robert Amos
”They’re exactly the same!” On a recent visit to the Pompidou Centre in
Paris, I saw lots of drawings and sketches from the famed Surrealists -
Max Ernst, Francis Picabia, Joan Miro. The little homemade books that
Victoria’s Andrew Dick was showing me were in every way their equal.
Currently Dick has been presenting his efforts at the Fifty Fifty Arts
Collective, a new storefront gallery at 2516 Douglas Street near Bay.
This is the sort of gallery that doesn’t have regular hours or even a
telephone, and mostly I have been gazing at the shows there through the
front window. Today (January 20) is the last day for Dick’s show and
he’s promised me he’d be there from 1 to 5 pm to open the door.
A few of his hundreds of colourful little drawings are in Value Village
frames, but shoals of them are simply taped to the walls. Each is a
unique adventure in style and medium. When pressed, Dick told me that
some of them are characters - “like an illustration” he said - and some
are “fine art drawings” - the more abstract ones.
There is a sureness and confidence in even the most bizarre of Dick’s
drawings, and a mystery too. The artist is a man of few words, and even
less given to explaining himself. So I sat him down and interviewed
him - his first interview! - to try to discover the wellsprings of his
practice and symbolic language.
Dick is 21, “born and raised in Victoria”. He admitted that “it was at
Esquimalt High School where I started getting into art... graffiti art
at the Trackside”. That was before the Rock Solid group took that
project to new heights. Dick remembers the inspiration of his teacher
Lorna Reid at EHSS. “She really did get the ball rolling,” Dick noted.
At home, Dick’s father set an example. “My dad was a modeller -
aircraft were his specialty - and he taught me about colour and
different kinds of paint.” Dick pointed out a collaborative sketch in
the show. His father had drawn the top and Andrew the bottom of a scene
of battling monsters. This is one of many examples of the surrealist
drawing game, “the exquisite corpse”, in the exhibition.
“Before art I was into basketball, but really art took over,” Dick
recalled. “After high school I knew that I had to do it forever.” Next,
Dick took a break from school - not at all an unusual strategy - and
spent the next year doing a lot of painting. He had a studio then, and
was “getting more into painting canvases.” One acrylic, about two
metres square, attests to this period. Now that the studio is gone he
again concentrates on the smaller scale. “I feel you can get really
intimate with a small piece - like a whole ‘nother world right there in
a spot on the paper.”
Dick also pursued his research in studying books on the Surrealists,
with whom he has discovered a natural affinity. When I mentioned the
art of Paul Klee, Dick noted that Klee was not an inspiration but he
had come to note a similarity in approach. This year, Dick’s girlfriend
is in Japan and the pop art and packaging she has been sending him from
there inspire his odd, and oddly familiar, images of kiddy cartoon
characters. There really is no telling where his subject matter will
come from, though he makes it his own in the process.
Dick hasn’t - yet - travelled to the art centres of the world. His
drawing, which is so close to cartooning, is often published by him in
homemade chapbooks. Nevertheless, he surprised me when he said he’d
never been interested in “comix” and graphic novels. Dick’s drawings
are entirely without narrative continuity. He seems to be a true
original.
As we made our way around the show I noticed some images which are
based on rubbings of patterned surfaces; cutouts pasted on coloured
paper; and even an old print (“from my granny’s house...”) which he has
painted over almost entirely. No two pieces are alike, yet they partake
of the same unerring compositional sense and confident colour choices.
Dick has volunteered to work with grade six students at Central Middle
School this year, and some of their efforts, echoing his style, adorn
the gallery windows. A quick comparison reveals that while there is a
similarity, Dick has a special knack.
“Some do have a lot more to say than others,” Dick admitted. “The best
are just like a sunny day... and sort of... it comes out.” This mix of
talent and innocence is thrilling to discover. Let’s hope Andrew Dick
can find the encouragement to continue what looks to be a promising
career.
___________________________________________
Copyright © 2005 Robert Amos
Robert Amos is an artist and art writer who lives in Victoria, B. C.. He can
be contacted by
e-mail
and you can view his paintings at
www.robertamos.com