THE ARTIST
I left school suddenly at 17 and moved down to Bath on a whim, much to the surprise of my parents. Gary is five years older than me, but he has always supported me and told me to do what I wanted to do.
I did not go to university right away, and when I did, I did a history of ideas degree, which has fewer job prospects than even an art degree! Through it all Gary has backed my decisions and been there for me. We have two other brothers and a sister but it was only Gary and I who moved out of our home town while each of us were making our way in life. There was a commonality there beyond just being brothers.
To work the way I do, you definitely need to have a certain mindset. I have been a freelance artist for 20 years and you do the job, get paid for it, and worry about the next when it comes. That is how I live, and I could not work any other way now.
I remember Gary always doing really, really well at school. He used to organise a quiz for the students, and I think he was a bit upset that I would never win it. I did not put as much into it as I should have done.
Gary has always appeared to be quite single-minded and in control of situations. Behind that front, however, he is a big softy really. He would do anything for anybody and has gone beyond the pale many times for our family and me. There are two sides to him and that he is very, very admirable.
When I paint him, I like to capture his particular combination of control and softness. I was watching a talk by musician Brian Eno and he was saying that if you have too much control, you make crap art but that if you do not have enough control you make crap art too. I agree, and think that good art requires a balance between control and lack of control.
During a drunken conversation about 20 years ago, Gary suggested we try to do some work together and collaborate on a project.
I was up for it because it was quite an interesting challenge for me as an artist to enter his scientific world. I wanted to do more than just illustrate the science – I wanted to make art that is art but that also had a strong science influence. We have been looking at the gut microbiome, which is where my portrait of him came from.