Central Otago contemporary commercial artist and art tutor Andrew Price believes inspiration also requires no small measure of perspiration, writes Shane Gilchrist.
Be it spin-painting or sketching, a public installation or a privately commissioned piece, art requires one common component that transcends medium. And that's perseverance, Andrew Price says.
Two years ago, while living in Queenstown - he is now based in Cromwell - the contemporary commercial artist and art tutor established QT Creative Kids, a series of art programmes aimed at providing the fundamentals of visual art to primary school children.
Price also works with secondary school pupils on concept development and academic writing and can be found at some Central Otago rest-homes, where he instructs elderly people in aspects of art, a process he describes as ''both extremely rewarding and humbling''.
In regards the younger folk, Price (37) says one of the greatest by-products of his classes is the fostering of patience.
''I talk to them continuously. It is a case of repeat, repeat, repeat, that art is not like some app which they can download and have this instant experience.
''You very quickly see the students who are after instant gratification as opposed to those who are prepared to put up with some mess and ambiguity in order to achieve their goals,'' Price says.
''It really does stretch a child's character.
''Some parents have higher expectations than others, but I don't do the kids' work for them. I also ask parents what they think the concept of ability is. I don't want 12 children to all paint in the same style; I want to see a child's personality in the work.''
Price, who is father to a 9-year-old and 8-year-old twins, was prompted to set up QT Creative Kids by comments from his children.
''I was hearing what they were saying when they came home from school regarding what the art teachers had them doing.
''While great and incredibly dynamic people, not all teachers have art as a part of their skill set. I thought, `well, I have a degree in arts; do you want me to help?'
''Art is not rocket science ... but if we instruct children incorrectly and give them poor-quality materials, they will get frustrated. However, if they, say, understood more about colour, they might not be so frustrated. I equip children with the foundational knowledge so they can produce art how they want to.''
These techniques range from sketching, drawing, printing, sculpture and photography, to colour theory, including spin-painting (using a spinning platform), which offers a good opportunity to put Price's words into practice.
''You could talk to any person about what different paints feel like and smell like and how they go on to the paper with different types of brushes, but it's only when a person does it that they internalise the information.
''It's so tacit, and that's part of the learning,'' says Price, who graduated from Middlesex University in 2000 with a bachelor of arts degree in fine art and contemporary art history.
In 2004, he and his New Zealand-born wife left Birmingham for Auckland; they later headed to Christchurch, where Price completed a bachelor of commerce degree (majoring in strategic human resource development) at the University of Canterbury in 2010.
NOW based in Cromwell and working towards an MA in visual art and design through the Auckland University of Technology, Price says spin-painting might seem relatively easy (although potentially messy), but it provides some valuable lessons.
''Spin-painting is focused on colour and colour relationships. People might be aware of Georges Seurat's pointillism painting. He was basically the first person to point out that it's not what colours you use but rather how they are arranged.
''One colour relative to another questions what is termed `colour constancy'. I will take young people through a process involving three or four colours and you can see on some of their faces how painting just floats their boat, they get it; they are excited by a colour.
''Once they get past four or five colours, the overall colour can get quite murky so, again, they are learning about basic colour mixing.
''There is a lot to it and, of course, there are factors such as hand-eye co-ordination.''
Issues of co-ordination might also crop up in Price's work with older people, yet ossification of artistic inclinations sometimes provides more of a challenge.
''Art therapy is a big field, but in essence I design art sessions for the elderly to circumvent the physical abilities they might have lost.
''Adults come to the party with their own store of experience, knowledge and expectations. I see everyone as an individual,'' Price says.
''It is something I'm really passionate about.''
Price is passionate, too, about art that is available to the wider public. Currently involved in discussions with at least three Central Otago organisations interested in displaying artwork on the outside of buildings, Price played a key role in a recent project that resulted in six murals being painted on the side of the Tin Goose Cafe in Alexandra.
Unveiled at Thyme Festival late last year, the murals' theme, ''Cherishing our Environment'', was inspired by ideas from by local Youth Forum and Ignite Youth groups. Four smaller panels (1.2m x 1m) were created in collaboration with year 7-8 pupils from the Clyde, The Terrace, St Gerard's and Alexandra Primary schools, Price completing the projects with two large panels.
Using video clips and photographs, Price has also documented the creative and artistic process, from the pupils' ''mind-maps, their initial designs, early concept pieces produced by the artist and the stages of production of all the murals''. Influenced by abstract-expressionism, modernism and post-modernism and the work of, among others, Mark Rothko, Wassily Kandinsky, Gerhard Richter, Robert Rauschenberg and Milton Avery, Price's main areas of practice are oil painting, photography and sculpture.
''The result of a quasi-`process-painting' style, my paintings explore the sequential and temporal nature of emotions. My paintings are of themselves ... landscapes to be visually explored and contemplated.''
