Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Artist best known for his drawings and paintings.
On the island
Eight records
Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67 (transcr. Liszt, S. 464/5)
I actually think it's quite amusing as well when I first heard it, which isn't too long ago, I I kept laughing.
That's just a very beautiful bit of piano music, I think. And I like Satis music. I love his although this title is rather ordinary. Some of his titles are rather terrific and very, very witty.
Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg: Hans Sachs' song
Oh, this is just nearly the end of the Master Singers of Nuremberg, Hans Sachs' song about art. It's just art about art, and I quite like that.
Paris Conservatoire Orchestra conducted by Roger Désormière
Uh well my next record is just a bit of les biche by Poulenc.
Bronislaw Kaper and Walter Jurmann
uh it's Jeanette McDonald singing San Francisco, which is actually this is only because it's about California and uh I think this is a very uh pretty song and really I liked it because it used to be sung by a marvellous drag queen in a bar.
Oh, this is the beginning of a rather kind of marvellous corny opera by Giordano.
Fud Livingston, Gus Kahn and Matty Malneck
This is just Really beautiful, Melon Munro singing I'm Through with Love.
Tristan und Isolde: Mild und leise (Mild and gently) 'Liebestod'Favourite
And it's the end of Tristan and Isolda, the Lieberstad, sung by Birgit Nielsen. And she's really just singing that she's through with love as well.
In conversation
Presenter asks
3:39When did you first start taking a special interest in drawing and painting? How old were you?
Well, I would think I was about ten when I decided that I wanted to be an artist. Maybe even younger, I don't know. I'm sh I'm positive when I was ten I knew that, yeah.
Presenter asks
4:16Had you any clear idea what you wanted to do in art [when you moved to Bradford School of Art]?
Well, no, I mean I was a very naive little sixteen year old schoolboy. Went to the art school and uh when they asked me what I I just said, Oh, I want to be an artist and they asked me if I had a private income and I said I didn't know what that was and they said well if you've not got one you can't be an artist because you'll never make a living at it but I thought that was really bad to start discouraging innocent 16 year olds so I took no notice.
Presenter asks
5:02Did [your family] discourage you towards this very precarious form of existence?
No, no. In a sense, I think I was quite lucky there, because perhaps a lot of other parents would have been more practical and said, oh, you can't do that, really. ... Oh, you should do this. You see, they didn't. They they just thought, well, maybe it's a good idea to be an artist and never gave it another thought.
The keepsakes
The book
Floyd Carter
I decided the only kind of book you'd really want to read and reread a lot really would be a pornographic book. Otherwise, you might fantasise too much on the island.
Presenter asks
5:24Did [your national service] seem a serious hold-up, or was it an opportunity to adjust your ideas?
I must admit, I thought it was a bit of a waste of time. But then, on the other hand, when I went back to art school, I used the time perhaps more eagerly and worked perhaps a bit harder.
Presenter asks
7:46Do you think that gold lame jacket helped [your success]? I mean, publicity is always important. I mean, had that got you talked about?
I don't know. I mean, I think I had to live it down, really. So I don't think it did. ... I think, like, in painting, it's not as important, really, because the audience for painting is, one must remember, very small and it really only affects a small number of people. And even in those days, if you only do ten pictures a year, all you have to do is find ten people who'll buy them, which really isn't very many, is it?
Presenter asks
9:01Didn't the pattern of change through that ten years [shown in your retrospective] seem to have a regular curve?
Well, I must admit when I saw the exhibition ... I must admit I was really rather apprehensive about it, thinking the early pictures just wouldn't stand up and they'd be a bit thin and things. And I must admit, even I was slightly impressed with it only because I saw that there was a continuity in the work, which you can only see if you can look back at ten years' work.
“I think at the time one just decided that's what you want to do. I mean I kept changing my mind. For all I know I might have kept thinking maybe I'd be an engine driver, but I didn't.”
“I've always thought of myself as a rather ordinary artist, really.”
“I never keep records. I don't keep photographs. I keep a few slides. I never get them out. I don't keep press cuttings or anything. So that was my first chance to look at it all.”
“Well, I decided the only kind of book you'd really want to read and reread a lot really would be a pornographic book. Otherwise, you might fantasise too much on the island.”