Inside Rose Wylie's Studio: A Glimpse into Her Artistic World
If an artist's studio offers insight into their world, Rose Wylie's space reveals much about the woman poised to become the first female British painter to hold a solo exhibition in the main galleries of London's Royal Academy.
The wooden floor, splattered with paint, is scattered with pages from old newspapers, some crumpled, their black and white print partially obscured by vibrant color splotches. Wylie explains that when a painting is not working, she scrapes the paint off.
"It's constantly coming off, so a lot of paint is on the floor".
Brushes, some stuck fast, protrude from paint pots arranged across the floorboards, table, and chairs. A large bouquet of long-dead flowers rests nearby, which she refuses to discard, saying,
"I can't bear to throw them away, they're so beautiful".
A bright pink and blue plastic lobster telephone adds to the eclectic atmosphere.
Prowling comfortably amidst the apparent chaos is Pete, the rescue cat she adopted over a decade ago, whom she believes is 16 years old.
All these elements contribute to a sense of anarchy fitting for an artist who, at 91, remains a rebel in the art world. Wylie describes herself as having "possibly was an early punk," despite being raised by Victorian parents who emphasized modesty and even forbade her from wearing lipstick. The child they raised had different ideas; deep red lipstick has become one of Wylie's trademarks.
Regarding her captivating paintings, she shares,
"I'm perfectly happy when people think they have been created by a much younger artist. Who wants to paint like an old person? It's fresher".
Wylie maintains the working hours of a teenager, painting late into the night—sometimes as late as twenty to four in the morning—when her village is quiet.
"Nobody phones, nobody knocks at the door, only Pete at the window, so there's no interruption."
She does not plan this schedule deliberately, usually starting work around 5 pm, but explains,
"You go on and then it becomes the night, it gets dark and then you think 'oh well, that's fine' and then you look at it again and you think 'No, it isn't, it's not fine, it is bad'. Then you go on and suddenly it's late. That's how it happens".
Exploring Wylie's Latest Works and Inspirations
Visiting her studio to discuss the upcoming London exhibition also offers a private view of Wylie's latest paintings. Large canvases cover every available wall space. One piece consists of two side-by-side canvases depicting a small yellow house behind an orange fence, repeated on both. This house is next door to hers in Kent, framed by a tree she describes as "reminiscent of Cezanne's Bathers." Wylie often references other artists in her work, but with a playful twist she points to this painting and remarks something unexpected.
"One afternoon as I walked in and looked at this, it seemed to me that it had transformed into a meat cleaver. A jumbo meat cleaver".
She indicates the orange fence on the right-hand canvas, which resembles a handle, and the entire white canvas of the left-hand painting, which looks like the blade.
Upon closer examination, the resemblance is striking.
"You can see it as a domestic narrative and then you can see it as a jumbo meat cleaver".
This shift in perspective is typical of Wylie's work, which often features sudden jumps and changes in viewpoint.
Wylie paints whatever inspires her, whether a person, animal, flower, film, newspaper photograph, or even a kitchen saucepan with steam rising.
She has painted footballers such as Wayne Rooney, Thierry Henry, and Ronaldinho, describing them as "public figures, it's the Greek idea of painting the Gods. People know what they're looking at and so they can see what the artist has done."
One of her notable subjects is Nicole Kidman, whom she depicted wearing a one-strapped dress based on a photograph from a film premiere.
Wylie has also drawn inspiration from Quentin Tarantino films, including Kill Bill.
"I see something which I think is good. I mean, in Kill Bill, there was this woman lying down. Uma Thurman had sliced off her arm. She was lying down there, still - I don't know - alive or dead, but her arm was sticking up, blood was coming out of it, like a Renaissance fountain picture, so I thought great".
Although the scene is visceral, Wylie emphasizes,
"It's the visual thing, the connection with fountains which I liked, not the goriness of it".
She describes her creative process as "poetic transformation" rather than "a slavish copy."
From Drawings to Paintings: Wylie's Creative Process
Wylie's paintings typically begin as drawings. She shares illustrations for The House Next Door, Or, Jumbo Meat Cleaver and another painting displayed on the studio wall featuring a brown bear with large claws alongside a blonde woman in a green pinafore dress.
This work was inspired by a combination of Henri Rousseau's paintings, a television advertisement about bear protection, and the actress Betty Davis, admired by Wylie for her "special, hooded eyes."
The exhibition Rose Wylie: The Picture Comes First features 90 works and, as Wylie describes, was "heaven-sent."
The title reflects her desire for viewers to focus on the images rather than the text often included in her paintings.
"I want people to look at the picture, not the writing… the picture comes first".
When painting, she admits to being "obsessed with it, I want to go on and I can't stop," but also acknowledges the challenges.
"It can go very horrid. It can be nasty, slimy and that's the torture. You're looking at something which you really don't like the look of."
Despite this, she perseveres, concluding,
"It's OK when it's finished."
A Non-Traditional Path to Artistic Recognition
Wylie defies convention not only through her age and bold, irreverent work but also through her unconventional career path. She attended Folkestone and Dover School of Art but ceased painting after marriage and motherhood to focus on raising her family.
Asked if she regretted this choice, she responds,
"No, I think it allows you not to get bored with it, and you've got a lot of stuff to work with."
She later earned an MA at the Royal Academy in 1981 but only gained significant attention in her seventies after participating in a show of under-represented and emerging women artists at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington.
The exhibition, titled Women to Watch, included seven US artists and one 76-year-old British artist. Following the show, Germaine Greer predicted,
"Life may be about to change for Wylie. Word has got out that she is seriously cool".
Wylie embraces this label but admits,
"With every painting, you think 'I can't do this'."
She declines to discuss the current market value of her works, stating,
"I could tell you but I'm not going to"
and emphasizing that financial gain is not her motivation.
However, she highlights ongoing gender disparities in the art market, noting,
"Men's paintings are still much higher than women's. There's something very wrong there... that should be fixed".
Wylie is forthright about the delay in a female British painter receiving a solo show in the Royal Academy's main galleries, calling it,
"obscene" and "historically quite extraordinary".
Nonetheless, she expresses delight at being chosen, saying,
"I love being the first woman painter".
Reflecting on History and Personal Memories
Among the early rooms in the exhibition are paintings depicting the Blitz. Few living artists today recall World War Two firsthand, but Wylie remembers vividly the sounds and smells of that era.
"The wail of sirens and then the release wail of the all clear and the smell of gas".
Her family relocated from London to Kent in 1940, though their home remained directly in the path of German bombers, with a bomb landing on the house.
She recalls the experience,
"I can remember the noise because it was quite extraordinary as it comes, not the explosion, the screech as it gets louder and louder and you think 'this is just impossible, it's noise', and then there's the explosion".
When asked what the child she was then would think of her current success, she replies,
"It would blow that little child's mind!"
The exhibition Rose Wylie: The Picture Comes First opens at the Royal Academy on 28 February.
