Mad genius of the genial and erudite Mr Doyle
It’s a wild and entertaining ride scrolling through the body of work of Martin Doyle.
The incredibly prolific Carterton sketcher, painter and cartoonist seems to embody the essence of the concept of creating art for its own sake.
As he puts it, he just draws what he sees, but if his work is a reflection of reality, it’s a quirky, comical and sometimes-a-little-bizarre world we live in.
His drawings vary from grotesque political parody to quaint community observations.
“Most of my art is based on my own life and the world around me.
“Specifically, I tend to draw what’s in front of me.
‘‘Even in doing that, many people either find the content or the style bizarre.
“I think it’s because simple reality of the artist’s true impression of what they’re looking at isn’t normally done.
“Just being an honest artist means creating imagery people find odd.
“In principle I draw what’s in front of me, but what’s in front of me might be psychological too.
“If there’s politics in the air, that’s in front of me, or how I’m feeling is in front of me and that colours my art.’’
Doyle uses a lot of whimsy and creativity and says “if art was only to depict the world as a it looks, a robot could do that. I think what an artist brings to the table is themselves.”
He estimated that he draws more than 1000 pieces a year.
“You can imagine that over 10-15 years, that’s a lot of drawings.”
Doyle said people tended to enjoy the vitality of his work, but there were those who didn’t like the risqué aspects of some of his drawings.
He used to draw political cartoons for Scoop News which meant there were now more than 1000 of his works in the New Zealand cartoon archive.
The 68-year-old loves to use Māori tikanga in his work, but mostly language, not imagery.
“Over the years I’ve had no hesitation in using Māori language.
‘‘When this Government has come out against Māori language I’ve put out posts written in Māori to make a stand and use it.”
With predominately Irish lineage, he does not claim whakapapa, but feels as a New Zealander the language is a national tāonga.
“I’ve been interested in Māori language and I’ve read the whole bible from beginning to end in Māori as part of my own learning process.”
He recently became involved in a debate online about the Hurricanes Poua haka criticising the Government.
“They’re [haka] a kind of dramatic, challenging statement.
‘‘In a way art ideally is like that. It should leap out at you. It doesn’t just hang on the wall.
‘‘Good art jumps off the wall and bites you on your backside.”