#0018 IMBUE - THE MAD PROFESSOR OF ART!

Welcome to the Creative Nowhere Land podcast. 

On this episode, we're lucky to be joined by Contemporary Artist and Mad Professor of Art, Imbue.  

Imbue and his work have been featured in The Guardian, Art Net and in Forbes Magazine.  But, to really understand it, you need to see it for yourself!  And when you see it, you'll understand why I call him the Mad Professor of Art. 

He creates everything from screen prints to chocolate machine guns.  He's stolen a statue from The Louvre and has even made art from £1 million worth of shredded cash!

In his first ever long-form interview, we talk about his creative journey and his work. Which is sometimes hard for even him to put into one particular box.  Some might call it Pop Art?  Often not conforming to any particular medium but always playing with familiar, repurposing and subverting the recognisable.  

With no formal training and just, in his words, a 'give it a go' attitude and a willingness to experiment with ideas, Imbue has turned the art that he creates into a thriving business through unique limited edition pieces and other clever ideas like a 24 Hour Art Club.

There's so much interesting and inspiring information in this episode. So let's dive down the rabbit hole and into the imaginative world of Imbue!

Check out the links below to explore Imbue's work as you listen.

IMBUE WEBSITE: https://imbuesource.com/

IMBUE INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/imbue/

Transcript

Welcome to Imbue's First Long-form Interview

Speaker 1 0:02

Hello everyone and welcome to the Creative Nobbeland podcast. This is another one that I'm really excited to share with you. Have you ever wondered what an artist would do with a million pounds in shredded cash? You're about to find out, because on this episode we're joined by contemporary artist and sort of mad professor of art, imbue. It's hard even for Imbue sometimes to categorise his art. Some might call it pop art, often not conforming to any particular medium, but always playing with the familiar, repurposing and subverting the recognisable. His work has been featured in the Guardian, artnet and Forbes, but this is going to be his first long-form interview, so we're really lucky and kind of honoured that he chose the Creative Noelle Land podcast.

Speaker 1 0:53

We discuss Imbue's creative journey. Starting out being excited by the emerging street art movement in the UK and with no formal training or real plan, just a willingness, in his words, to give it a go and experiment with ideas. He's turned the art he creates into a thriving business through unique limited edition pieces and other clever ideas, like a 24-hour art club. As I said, it's hard to describe Mbue's work and I joked about him being kind of a mad professor of art, so be sure to check out the links to his work while you listen to the podcast, where you'll find everything from screen prints to chocolate machine guns. So let's dive down the rabbit hole and into the wonderful and imaginative world of imbue.

Speaker 1 2:09

So, first of all, I think I need to say thank you for doing the creative no land podcast, because, if I'm not mistaken in you, this is going to be your first apart from press and newspapers and articles like that. This is your first long form interview, right? Yeah, definitely. Yeah, you did do a podcast previously, didn't you? Unfortunately, they messed up the sound. Something went wrong. Yeah, so let's just double check that. Well, it says that we're recording. So fingers crossed that we're all good. So that was my practice run. So this is it. This is my debut. Oh, you should be a pro then. Now, why haven't you done any interviews as such? I don't know. I guess I'm always busy working and I'm not I wouldn't say I'm like flooded with interview requests, but I do get occasional ones, and then it's happened a few times where I'm excited about it and then I just forget, forgot about it. Yeah, yeah. So there you go, our listeners. We're even more lucky that InViewers remembered that we were recording a podcast. Yeah, I think you were persistent and you said, like, right, I can come to you this day, this time. So it's like, okay, you made it nice and easy. Well, that's, that's what we aim to do.

Speaker 1 3:10

My next question, which is going to be probably a bit off the wall from that where does one find a million pounds worth of shredded cash in the um? I can't remember exactly that one, but I've bought them, them off eBay and different auction sites, but they're quite hard to come by, but they're kind of official, so they come from different banks. So I've had some from the bank of England, some from, like, I guess, the equivalent of the German bank, and yeah, it's, when money goes out of circulation, it's officially destroyed. And they do the same in America as well, and I think they used to sell it more commonly, these big compressed bricks, as almost like a souvenir, novelty item. Okay, but yeah, it's really hard to get now.

Finding & Using Shredded Money in Art

Speaker 1 3:52

But I don't always. I just let. I let people use their imagination as well, like, did you go searching for that, or was it something that you saw and went, oh, now I've got a great idea. I think I had some when I was a kid, so I was aware of it, and then I'd already been doing stuff with resin and then you can mix different things into resin, like pigments, powders, and that was just so. I was like, oh yeah, you could mix that in, like okay, and and for context, because some people probably won't know what we're talking about, can you tell us a little bit about the edition of pieces that you're talking about with the a million pounds worth of? Yeah? Yeah, so the first one I did I'm trying to think of the years now. Quite a while ago, I did an edition of grenade and they were cast in resin and they were just using shredded dollars and that shredded dollars gave a kind of green camo look which fitted well with the grenade. And then the top piece of the grenade was cast in bronze and gold plated, so it was like a really cool looking actual size grenade. And then more recently, when I did an exhibition in London, I did some full size skulls and with those I use like a blend of different shredded money to get the tone of, I guess, like an antique skull. So that was made of shredded 10 pound notes and that's where I used the million euros which, when it was all mixed together, it gave this kind of more beige cream color and that was part of the death and taxes. Yeah, that was the exhibition. Yeah, right, okay. So I guess people are now listening to this going. What he cast money into grenades, cast money into skulls.

Speaker 1 5:32

How would you describe the work that you do? Yeah, it's always tricky, actually, because it's one of those funny things to say, especially people you don't know oh, what do, what do you do? Or, oh, I'm an artist. It sounds kind of ridiculous or just like you're unemployed or something. And then people oh, what kind of art? Oh, paintings or watercolors. They just imagine, you know, very traditional oil paintings or landscape. So I often sort of have to say I'll just show you my Instagram because it's easier than trying to explain what I do, my Instagram because it's easier than trying to explain what I do. But I guess really I'm not limited by any kind of medium or I like to think of ideas and I'm inspired by everything and everyday culture and then I like to try and find a way to communicate that idea and it does often seem to usually be some sort of small sculpture or 3d piece. That's kind of what I guess I've been drawn.

Speaker 1 6:29

Would you call it pop art. Yeah, I guess it's definitely inspired by pop art and it's obviously always referencing kind of familiar icons and logos and, yeah, characters listening to this you're hearing elaborately cast skulls, grenades. I'm looking at crosses that look like haribo sweets, chocolate guns, moon basketballs. I'm looking at prints, I'm looking at nasa space tickets. As I said, there is no real limit, yeah, but those ideas and concepts now they're pretty elaborate, right, yeah, I think so. Yeah, and I guess, yeah, the common theme or the common link is using things that people are familiar with, which I really like to do that kind of like what you said, where, rather than going in completely from zero, where you're having to communicate your idea or design a character and people have to get to know it.

Speaker 1 7:22

I think, with my work, people see something that they think they've seen before, or it looks familiar, but then it's got a different twist on it or it's not what they originally thought it was. But I mean, obviously we're sat in a studio and probably when we share the blog posts I'll include some pictures, but we're surrounded by 3d printers, tools, resins, casting machines, all sorts of crazy. As I say, you're like the mad professor when I walk in the studio, but I'm guessing it didn't start like this. No, no, I mean, it literally started at college. So come on, then let's go down memory lane.

Speaker 1 7:59

What is your first memory of creating and art? Yeah, I guess I've always. It's always come naturally and I've always been drawn to it. It's not something I've had to get into or make an effort to do so. I think like the oldest kind of cliche thing is my dad giving me like sellotape and cardboard boxes and you know, cutting them up and taping things together, and I've always been that sort of kid. But it's interesting that you went there rather than colored pencils on a piece of paper. Yeah, it's more construction and making. Yeah, I guess I've always been sort of like a maker and a builder and I used to like making skate ramps, tree houses, you know all that sort of stuff, and I guess my dad was encouraging of that. It wasn't like, oh, don't play with that, it's dangerous.

Speaker 1 8:44

Are your parents creative? Yeah, yeah, they are. Yeah, and I guess my dad I've always seen him. Yeah, he's made different things, whether that's like diy or problem solver. Yeah, I would say yeah, I'd say we're very similar, so I've always been inspired by him and he's always encouraged me. It just comes natural to me. Like some people, they will say oh, how do you get started on that? Or how would I do that, where I guess my attitude has always been I'll give it a go, see what happens. So everything I do has come from that approach. I don't really have any formal training of anything other than youtube videos.

Speaker 1 9:19

So as a as a child and there's no gearing your studies or anything towards art creativity I think I just wasn't good at school, especially in the kind of traditional subjects. And then I guess the only subject I liked and enjoyed was art. But again, it wasn't necessarily like I loved fine art and I loved painting. I did like doing all of those different things fine art and I loved painting, I did like doing all of those different things, and I would often just use the art lessons to sort of pursue my own ideas, especially as I got a bit older and I moved into college. I kind of saw it as an opportunity to just use the school's materials. And so you printers and things you went and studied art at college, uh, kind of like sixth form college, right, so, yeah, so that's as far as my education went. Yeah, and what were you creating? I mean, you're saying you're using their facilities to make stuff because presumably they're trying to go oh, here's life drawing here's, yeah, yeah, and I was interested in all of it.

Defining Imbue's Unique Artistic Style

Speaker 1 10:19

But I think it was around that time quite early on, that is, when sort of street art and Banksy and those things that was all kicking off. So that was the first of art I'd seen. I was like, oh, this is cool, this is not kind of fusty, old-fashioned art, this is something new and contemporary. And I think that mixed with skateboarding and it was like the graphics on skateboards and the DIY attitude of I knew people that were a bit older and like they would make a clothing brand for skateboarding different things like that. So but you said you had no formal art training. You come out of sixth form, college and what you just go, oh, I fancy being an artist. Is that the plan, or was there any plan? There was no plan.

Speaker 1 11:04

I think everything has come around out of sort of circumstance and I never had a grand vision or kind of a career path or anything like that, and I obviously had many years of making stuff and just barely scraping by, but I haven't really ever had a proper job. So when I was in Brighton, I was living with my brother at the time doing a bit of street art and really getting into that kind of thing. When you say doing a bit of street art, what sort of stuff are you doing? Just sort of putting stickers up, posters, stencils? Are you clear? Yeah, because I've used it. So where did Inview come from? So that was me and a friend at college where we liked the idea of doing like a clothing brand or something like that and we settled on that name and then that never really led anywhere. But then as I got into street art and doing stickers and paste ups, I think I just carried that name over. So it's been in existence for quite a long time now.

Speaker 1 11:59

I've got connections down in brighton. I remember seeing your stickers down there and all those sorts of things. Yeah, yeah, quite a long, yeah, yeah. And was that it just logo, stickers of the imbu logo, or were there something a bit more subversive? Were you mixing any? I think all sorts, yeah. And then the imbu logo, like the eye, that's much more modern, that's probably probably six, seven years old.

Speaker 1 12:21

Okay, yeah, compared to when I was doing stuff back in brighton, it would have just been characters in viewers, tech, different things like that. Yeah, I didn't necessarily have any distinct style or anything. I think I was just really enjoying experimenting with these things. But you weren't looking at imbue as such, as a, dare I say, brand. No, I don't think so. I think I was just sort of doing different things, different projects.

Speaker 1 12:47

I'm intrigued to get to the bottom of that, though. What are those projects? I mean, I know you've had a million since then, but yeah, I mean, I guess one of the things I did, which at the time and this is going way back, this is probably, I think, 2008 I did a thing. It was like a drug vend sculpture, where I'd repurpose some old sweet vending machines, design new labels and put what looked like bags of heroin and cocaine in, and then I'd smuggled that onto Brighton Pier, set it up in a little location that looked like it was meant to be there and then filmed people's reactions and so that kind of thing, which that's quite. You know, some people are just doing a few stencils. That's in bouncy. That, yeah, that's still quite a big project, yeah.

Speaker 1 13:30

Yeah, I guess I was just young and didn't didn't have anything else to do. I mean that's great, but to come up with the concept of going right, I'm going to find a vending machine and fill it with fake drugs, rather than I'm just finding my way in the art world. Yeah, yeah, some stickers I'm maybe doing some stencils on. I think that was it. I just sort of had that. Was that the biggest sort of the first big installation sort of piece? I would say so, yeah, and it was like, again, it was just I just did it myself, it was just like a fun little project. But that was the first thing I did, where for years later people would say, oh, I remember that, oh, I saw that, or different things like that. So it had a little bit of an impact.

Speaker 1 14:11

And I remember putting the video on YouTube and it got a lot of views, like you know, for the time back then that was early days YouTube and it was kind of a multi-process project which is something I quite enjoyed doing where it was the designing the machine and making it look realistic, repainting parts of it, the smuggling it on and installing it and then the filming of people's reactions, so like the whole project came together as the video. That was almost like the finished piece. What was the most extreme reaction you had to the drug vending machine. I got a lot of reactions before I'd installed it as well. I was like looking at different places. I had some parents that was outraged, but I kind of explained to this guy and he was like I knew it wasn't real drugs but I thought it was sweets and they'd stylized it like drugs to try.

Speaker 1 14:57

What are you trying to say at that point with that piece? Again, I'm trying to think how old I was of like probably very early 20s and it probably was moving to brighton and it being kind of different and being like, oh, there's a, there's a lot of drugs around, but it's probably been, um, yeah, I'd probably been a bit sheltered from that before. So I think that was kind of the idea that was coming through, the kind of the availability of things like that. Again, I feel that's quite an extreme piece to create and again, not with any real commercial endeavor, it's just a shock and awe. Yeah, again, I guess it's just I was so excited by that street art movement of putting something out there.

Early Creative Journey and Street Art

Speaker 1 15:42

It seemed so liberating that you could just come up with an idea and you could just go put it out there and you didn't need any permission from anyone. I think that's why so many people were drawn into street art, whereas if you'd maybe been into art and then you've got to try and approach a gallery and then maybe they like your work, maybe they don't, it was something that really suited me, of like. Like I was saying, going back to skateboarding, it was just kind of you just did it, you know. I think that was the, but how are you sustaining at this point? I mean, I know you say you're living with your brother and beg borrowing and stealing, but how do you afford a vending machine? Are you making any money from your art? Is it a commercial enterprise in any way? At this point I had the imbue name.

Speaker 1 16:26

I started producing things and I remember borrowing money off my brother not a lot and getting some screen prints produced, because that was I had seen other people I looked up to and other artists I knew. At that time, the early days of street art, people were releasing limited edition print runs and I explained almost did like a little business pitch to my brother oh, can I borrow some money, I'm gonna get some screen prints made, I'm gonna hopefully sell them for this much and then I'll give you your money back, kind of thing, and I think he obviously believed in you, yeah, I guess. So, yeah, which is? You know, I've got a lot to thank him for. You know, he let me live with it and stuff like that.

Speaker 1 17:06

And uh, yeah, I actually did the prints and I guess it was just kind of a bit of the naivety that made a little website. Uh, I shared them on the internet and again, this is all early days kind of of the internet and I even went to one of the local galleries or maybe I emailed them and I just said, hey, I'm an artist, I've got these prints, are you interested in any? And I think they emailed back like within a couple of hours saying, yeah, yeah, we'll take 10 of those, or something like. So kind of like, okay, I really it was probably right place, right time. I really hit the ground running. So, and what were the screen prints, what were they of that? They must have liked the work. Yeah, yeah, I think at the time, my first print it was kind of a snow white, like a seductive snow white, oh, okay, which is probably one of the first images, and that's probably something I was pasting up and doing stickers, of that kind of thing. But, yeah, they took them. I think they sold them. They ordered some more. It was probably only an addition of 50 or something.

Speaker 1 18:05

How did that feel when you had your first gallery selling your prints? Yeah, I mean, back then it was like I felt I'd made it, but then, as someone, as I say, who doesn't seem at that point to have much necessary commercial, like with the conceptual pieces, like the vending machine, unless someone comes and buys that whole piece, whole piece, yeah, unlikely. It's more about trying to get the name out there. I think so. Yeah, I think at that time, that's what I was pursuing. It was a bit of recognition and again, that links with street art and graffiti of that putting your name out there, yeah, and getting people to see it. So I think at the time, like that's what I was most interested in and most excited by. Okay, so galleries start selling it to you, please. They put in a few orders for things like that.

Speaker 1 18:52

Again, the maker and creator in you. You build your own website, you start selling your prints through that. Yeah, I mean, it's early doors, isn't it what we on 2000? Yeah, like 2009, 2008, 2009, 2010, smartphone and yeah, yeah, it's like, when you look back, it was actually a very different time. Yeah, was your market for your work much more bright and centric because you were doing the paste ups in the probably, yeah, street art stuff down there, but I was sending stuff to other plays, like posting things out and stuff like that, and how do you think they were coming across your work? I think at that time you had different websites. You had like Flickr where people would share. That was like early, that was pre-Instagram, wasn't it? And then there was forums for street art and graffiti and things like that. So I think it was like early days of what people did before Instagram. And was that you going onto the forums to put your work on there or was that people spotting your work, say, around Brighton? I think a bit of both. Yeah, yeah, interesting, like we say it's that brand recognition, isn't it? Yeah, totally yeah, and we'll dip into that much more later.

Speaker 1 19:56

About turning art and creativity into a business, which I think you've done incredibly well, thank you, think you've done incredibly well, thank you. What would you say from there? Bright and the galleries and the screen prints, what would you say? The next sort of turning point for you was in terms of creating. When did it start turning a bit more into the oh, I can do additions of sculptures, products? Yeah, I think, just being a maker and liking to create things, I've never sort of felt like, oh, I should try and do something different or I should try and make a sculpture or something. And even now, to this day, I'm excited by new ways of creating things. So when I thought of like an idea that would work as a 3D sculpture, I'm excited with learning the technique or working out how I would pull that off, because they are so broad and so diverse. As I say, I'm looking at a nasa ticket to space prints, I'm looking at crosses with pills inside them. There's so much different work. Yeah, yeah, I guess.

Speaker 1 20:56

Um, where do your ideas come from? And I know it's everywhere, but yeah, it does seem. I think. I think it genuinely is everywhere, because I think some people have this idea that artists are inspired by other art or going to an art gallery, and I do like going to different galleries and looking at Renaissance paintings and stuff, but I probably get more inspiration from just the day-to-day and maybe like packaging or looking for those things that people are used to Like over there with, like the chocolate gun. I had that idea of like. It's such an iconic visual, not even just by any one company, but a chocolate box with that formed plastic tray and then the chocolate color and the foil in there. I think it's bringing those elements together. But yeah, you wouldn't see something like that or you wouldn't get inspired to make something like that by going to an art gallery. So I guess that comes from just day-to-day living really, and I guess I'm naturally curious with everything that I come across.

Speaker 1 21:56

That's a version of the everyday item. It's that familiar, like you said before, the recognizable, whether it's a disney snow white, but maybe she's a bit more saucy or seductive. Yeah, the death and taxes. You use the disney fonts. There is that familiarity and that's why I call it pop art, yeah, yeah, do you think that makes our more accessible to people in some ways? I think so. Yeah, because I think that's what helped me get more of a love for art and I think that's why sometimes people criticize street art or pop art. But that is also why it found such a broad audience and that is why you could say Banksy really is now one of the most famous artists in the world. And I think it's because there's an element of the everyday person can see something he does and get it or get their own meaning from it.

Speaker 1 22:46

And sometimes people may be in higher art, they look down on that. Oh, it's a little bit too direct or it's a little bit too simple, but for me I kind of I like that idea of being able to communicate something directly with someone. And is there something to be said for focusing on sort of mass appeal? Yeah, potentially, I guess there's a balance, because you've essentially got like pop music, which is that's going to have the broadest appeal to the most people and sell the most units. I don't think anyone would say it's the best music. It's maybe commercially the best music. So, yeah, I guess you've got to find your own balance. I don't think I ever go out of my way to think, oh, this will really appeal to a big market. I think I'm making stuff I like, but then I also think you've worked very hard to build your own market. Does that make sense? Yeah, yeah, which, again, we'll talk about the business structure of things a bit later on.

Speaker 1 23:41

So is there a next project after, as I say, the Brightonon you're setting with galleries, prints. You've done the drug vending machine. Is there a landmark project that you go? Oh, that then lifted me to another level. I think it was just being very persistent and making myself useful in the small brighton art scene. There was a couple of galleries and I would go to every show opening because I wanted to and I was interested to see the new work that was coming out. But I would also see with those galleries if I could help them out in any way or show them my art.

Speaker 1 24:16

And I don't know whether it was like you know, they kind of saw me as a young artist and, oh, let's give this kid a chance. And then then, yeah, they had an exhibition on, but they had a smaller gallery upstairs or a smaller space, really like. And then I guess I asked and they were like, yeah, you could do a little exhibition up there. Oh, yeah, so that was my first solo exhibition and I guess that came about through persistence, like they didn't come banging my door down saying, oh, come on, do a solo show for us. It was me saying I'd love to do something, you know, but I think that's important, isn't it? Yeah, drive, if you believe exactly, and I think they'd seen enough things I'd done to know that I could deliver something that wouldn't be, you know, amateur.

Speaker 1 24:57

So what was in your first solo show? I think I had the drug vending machines on display. I had posters, posters of those. I had other panels that were torn it looks like torn advertising posters, so you would see one half of one image, half of another image, giving kind of like a conflicting message. I remember having an Inview sign that was made out of letters from all closed down shops. It was just like a ransom sign. So, yeah, it was very kind of letters from all closed down shops. It was just like a ransom sign. So, yeah, it was very kind of experimental and just, I guess, things I was working on at the time.

Speaker 1 25:30

I mean, I was wanting to make stuff. Not all of it was for sale, but I was wanting to make sure that I had stuff that obviously was for sale because even at that time it was like money coming in was uh, you know, money that I could use to make stickers and live on and keep pursuing, and what was that? The everything that you made you just pumped back into pretty much. Yeah, I mean, it was just like I was. I was a tour for a very, very long time. Yeah, that's, that's standard, I think, for a lot of artists.

Speaker 1 26:01

So how was your first solo show received? Yeah, I think as well as you can expect first. But, like you say, you've got yourself in that art scene of brighton. You were going to the galleries. Did you do any sort of guerrilla marketing to get people to come to your show? Oh, yeah, I think so.

Speaker 1 26:16

Yeah, putting posters up, printing flyers, it was very much just, I was very, very driven like you might get someone that would have been a similar age to me maybe they were in a band and they would be promoting their band and putting posters up, hanging out flyers I was sort of doing the same for myself, but as an artist you didn't have that. Because I sometimes find maybe sometimes artists have a bit of snobbery that people should just love my work. Yeah, yeah and yeah. And I would say for years I've come across that with different people, even more recently, where it's kind of it's almost like it's a bad thing to sell your artwork and some people want to live in that world of the struggling artist, or just for the romance of it, yeah, or they just want to be commissioned to do like a public art piece. You know, there's nothing wrong with any of those things, but I think for me from early age, it kind of just works that way of I want to make stuff, people like it enough I can make an edition, people will buy it. It gives me money to live on and make the next creation.

Speaker 1 27:17

So, did the first solo show make you any money? Did you sell enough to? Yeah, yeah, it did, yeah, yeah, yeah, amazingly. And then you sell enough to? Yeah, yeah, it did. Yeah, yeah, yeah, amazingly. And then so, did you already have the next projects in mind? Like I don't think. Like I mean, it was very there wasn't a lot of thinking into the future when I was that age. It was kind of like oh, wow, I've made some stuff, I've got a little bit of money in my pocket. That money would sort of evaporate, and then I'm thinking, okay, what am I gonna do next? So no real plan then? No, no, not at all. I mean, as I've got older I've got more organized and have more of a long-term plan, but for most of my life it was very just day-to-day. Did that work, though, for what you were doing. No, no, it was very stressful. I was going to say, seeing the work now and seeing that evolution, there's a lot that goes into it and I know we've spoken about back then. It was more screen print stickers, maybe smaller things. So what's the next project? That was the big one, the big brainwave. I'm looking for those landmark moments in Imbue's career.

Speaker 1 28:20

So you had your first solo show. There was probably quite a long stretch where it was just like screen prints and print releases and that was sort of through galleries and your website. Yeah, yeah, following that same sort of pattern. I feel like that was sort of just what everyone was doing at that time. I'm trying to think of probably wasn't for quite a while where I did something that was 3d or did something different.

Speaker 1 28:42

I feel like that was a big tipping point where and I've tried to stick with that like producing stuff that is more difficult to make and maybe with a print I always had this kind of feeling that people don't know what necessarily goes into a screen print and then they might see it and it's very one-dimensional and oh, it's a poster, it's a print. I could print that myself on my printer at home. But I think when I started to make stuff that people would like but also be like, I don't even understand how you put that together, like I was saying, with the grenades putting different materials together and the shredded money in the resin and then the top piece cast in bronze and gold plated. It's like all these elements on top of each other that make it something very unique and hopefully special. But where does that come from, that ability? Because that's a big jump from a screen print. Yeah, that probably wasn't my first thing. I'm trying to my first. I really can't. I don't have the best. I've got so many wonderful little the rabbits, the chocolate guns, the basement Egyptians I'm just trying to get from. How do we jump from selling some screen prints being like, well, that's an artist, that's what artists do. Got a gallery that represents me Brilliant, but a lot of people perhaps would have not rested on their laurels but have gone. Oh, that's great, I'll just keep churning out prints.

The Drug Vending Machine Installation

Speaker 1 30:05

How did that evolution from just being prints to the physical? Yeah, I guess it was probably my own excitement, like how I had been really excited by street art. I probably then sort of saw like art toys or designer toys, like they were really big around that time and what, like cores and people like that, or, yeah, I guess cores, and there was like kid robot, things like that, different brands putting out these designer art toys, and I guess for me and other people that was just like, wow, that's cool, that's exciting. And then I guess, yeah, probably just working out how to make silicon molds, working out how to mix resin and stuff and then just giving that stuff a go. And then, yeah, it probably worked well because maybe not as many people were doing that, so that when I did an edition of 50 sculptures or something they would sell because it was sort of something new and exciting. In the same way it was for me, it was for the audience as well, and there's a lot of playful repurposing of the familiar.

Speaker 1 31:09

What's the first sculpture piece that you did then? I'm not 100 sure, but I think it might be that facebook crop or a version of that and that was an idea and I think I probably mocked that up on the computer and again, you know, could have done that as a print. The message would still come across and still work. But I think there was something about making it real and having that sort of solid tangent and for anyone wondering what we're talking about, we will include some stuff in the show notes, but it's the famous f from the facebook logo with jesus pinned to it. Yeah, yeah, you're. You're not a religious man, I'm not, no, no, but obviously we're all aware of that. Yeah, yeah. So I guess that's it. It's kind of a lot of the first icons and logos.

Speaker 1 31:54

You've seen, as a kid I do stuff with other things Coca-Cola and stuff but religious stuff is kind of up there with some of the most familiar things around the world. Really, I mean, it's quite an obvious comment, isn't it? But what were you trying to say with the jesus pinned to a facebook? I think it was just that sort of parallel of facebook came out of nowhere and then spread across the globe. The new religion, yeah, and that was the title of the piece. Yeah, new religion yeah, it just kind of spread and everyone was on there, and I guess, in the same way, the church was a social network. It was where people met. It just kind of spread and everyone was on there, and I guess, in the same way, the church was a social network. It was where people met, it was where people spread ideas, just a modern take on that. But you obviously just had that parallel, that the F is only subtly different from the cross shape. Very cool.

Speaker 1 32:39

And, as I say, there's lots of those satirical, familiar, slightly comedic references in your work. Is the playing with the corporate identity? Is that about? It's not you being anti-consumerism, but is that more of a reflection, trying to reflect people and society back on themselves? Does that make any sense? Yeah, I think I've just always enjoyed that of like playing around with the familiar, and I don't. I think there's nothing better than when people see something and it wasn't what they expected, but you know it felt familiar. So maybe if that's when I used to put posters up in the street and from a distance it's like, oh yeah, that's an advert for blah blah, and then they get a bit closer and it's like, oh, that's, that wasn't why you actually read it. Yeah, and I used to quite like as well. You can go two ways with it, where it's really clearly just a parody and it's just sort of taking the piss, or you can do it subtly different and people aren't quite sure and then they're kind of like questioning themselves what's the one that you think's been the most subtle that people have had to double take on.

Speaker 1 33:45

Uh, I think, yeah, going way back, I did one for a wkd poster at the time. It was just that baby, just alco pops. They're basically designed for kids and they marketed it with that. Have you got a wkd? Or you know, have you got a wicked side? And I copied one of their posters quite precisely, but instead of just the picture of the bottle, it was a smashed bottle on the ground with blood on it, obviously commenting on people drinking and getting violent, and that was one I pasted around and it was the same. It was a double take kind of thing. It looked like a WKD poster. When you properly looked, it was a very dark message and then, yeah, that was something I did. I actually received a legal letter about that one. That was there really the only time I've ever had anything like that. Yeah, what from wkd? Yeah, yeah, but did that make you feel quite good? Because they've seen it? Yeah, yeah, I thought it was cool. Yeah, this is great, I thought it was funny.

Speaker 1 34:40

And did you have much? I mean, because you've got a lot of the religious stuff. Did you get any backlash for any of that? You've got the crosses filled with pills. You've got Jesus crucified on a Facebook cross, I think you do sometimes, but I don't think people are super extreme about it. And in some ways, all publicity, good publicity, right, yeah, yeah, do you feel that that's what art is? It's got to trigger some sort of response, uh, good or bad. It's good if it does, but I guess not necessarily, like, just for the sake of it. You know, I mean, you could just come up with anything really provocative just for the, but that's not the goal.

Speaker 1 35:18

No, I think some people probably do that, like, so what's at the core of your art then? What is it you're trying to say? Is that a bit? Yeah, I wouldn't say I have like a kind of a grand vision, but there is an underlying tone. There's lots of corporate branding, consumerism, yeah, capitalism.

Evolution from Prints to 3D Sculptures

Speaker 1 35:36

To a way, I guess it comes down to doing stuff and making stuff, because I I like doing it. Um, and I guess that's why stuff has changed over time. When I was younger it was I was really obsessed and I loved putting stuff on the street and doing stickers and it was an all-consuming kind of thing. As I've got older, I prefer making stuff in the studio, less guerrilla more. Yeah, you say you've turned that guerrilla nature into something a bit more business-like and a bit more organized, right, yeah, yeah, but the important thing is that I I think for me my grand goal just enjoying my life that's brilliant goal yeah, and it's always kind of like tongue-in-cheek, been a bit like, oh, I'm avoiding having a real job, um, and then luckily it has grown into a proper job. I mean, you say luckily, but even when it was down to the street art stuff, you were the one doing it. You were grafting, you were handing out flyers, you were putting up the stickers. Yeah, totally yeah.

Speaker 1 36:33

When did you start seeing it as maybe more of a I could actually turn this into a quote-unquote career or commercial enterprise or well, I guess, like, for the longest time it was just I like doing this, I have to make and sell stuff because I don't have a job. So it was almost like this has to work, yeah, but probably a good pressure, and I'm lucky because I did that when I was younger, whereas as you get older and you've maybe got more responsibility if you've already got a job, I can't imagine it would be really hard to just quit your job and start doing something else if it's need must. Does that put pressure on you to just get work out there, or did you find that you're actually innovating and coming up with newer ideas? Yeah, I think a bit of both. If you are thinking of it as this is what I do, then it's sort of your job to come up with new ideas and write these things down, whereas maybe if you just do it as a hobby, there is no pressure, so you might come up with some good ideas, but it might be few and far between.

Speaker 1 37:38

What does ideas generation look like for InView then? Back then, was it literally blank page. I'm going to sit down and work things out or was it just grow about my day and the ideas come? Yeah, I mean, I think it is sort of a skill that you can train, because some people say stuff like that, don't they like oh, I can't draw, oh, I wish I could think of fun. Stuff is, I guess, like anything. If you maybe set yourself that assignment and then you sat down okay, this is my job today, I'm going to come up with some ideas. It might be no good, but you gotta practice it, like going to the gym or something.

Speaker 1 38:10

Yeah, creativity is a muscle, isn't it? The more you use it, the better you get. I imagine, the more those ideas start to flow and the more your mind. Yeah, it's tuned like that. So would it start like that? Would you start with a blank page and go I want to do something around coca-cola. What's good with coca-cola? Probably, I mean, I do it's. Yeah, it's very hard to explain, I guess.

Speaker 1 38:32

At the moment I don't even really use a sketchbook, it's just notes app on my phone. So I've got all the ideas in my head but I'm always like, oh, yeah, there's something there, I'm going to write that down. So that is sort of my process really. It would sometimes just be a sentence and like you might read it and it doesn't make any sense, so it wouldn't evoke a finished artwork. Well, for instance, like the facebook piece, it might just be a new religion. You write that down and that's possibly yeah, yeah, yeah. And then I've got loads of stuff like that written down.

Speaker 1 39:01

Um, there's somewhere I've got like a seed of an idea for years and then it just I guess it's sort of working in the background of your head of like that idea is in there and it's kind of maturing. It will flourish when it needs to flourish. Yeah, yeah, I think. Yeah, it's just, they're all in my head, but there's also like a backup on my phone and then sometimes I'll just go in like my kind of idea and scroll through of it oh yeah, oh, that was a cool like. Yeah, I should think more about that or I should like and then, yeah, sometimes I'll sort of struggle with these things. I've got the seed of an idea that's not quite there and there's a missing ingredient.

Speaker 1 39:36

Have you ever, have you ever had a major creative block or anything like that, where you've gone? Oh, my god, luckily, my last edition, but now I can't think of a single thing to do, not really, which is kind of mad. But I have definitely had nights where I've thought not as much now but maybe quite a few years ago where I'd think, oh man, what am I doing? Yeah, what if I run out of ideas? What if people don't like this anymore? Don't mean, it's probably just a bit of, but then I guess this takes us a bit more down a business context. Yeah, totally, because now you've got a thriving email list, you've got a big social media following, which obviously we've spoke about.

Speaker 1 40:15

When you first started, social media wasn't even a thing. Yeah, yeah, and you release limited edition issues that pretty much, from my observation, pretty much sell out every time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So how do we get there? Because I think that is the dream for most artists creatives going well, the first thing I do is I put it out to my email list. It's got 10 000 people on it, so that gives me a much better chance than most artists exactly, yeah, yeah, of seeing. I think, where does that come from? Did you see art as a business or did you see that galleries you've got to pay them a commission. Maybe I should be doing this myself. What's the evolution of, yeah, imbu and imbusourcecom, because that is the home of all the editions, it's the home of the newsletter. I think it's like a lucky mix of things where I remember thinking that way.

Speaker 1 41:08

I don't know if I necessarily started building an email list from the beginning, because I've got a memory of thinking like, oh man, I wish I had all the emails of the people that have already bought stuff. But, yeah, I sort of. But I have had an email list for a long time. Were you seeing others doing that? Because, as I said Probably yeah, yeah, you've got to have that influence of oh, that's interesting. I think I probably saw other people doing that and it made sense of like you don't want to be starting from zero every time. You want to start gaining even before instagram. You know, like getting your followers and there's people whether they might just be interested in seeing what you're up to. They might want to know about if you've got an exhibition, or they might want to see your latest release and buy it. And how are you encouraging people?

Speaker 1 41:54

I suppose newsletters back then were probably quite a new thing. Did it feel more, a bit more novel to be on an email newsletter whereas everyone now has got one? I think that's that's true. It's like it wasn't like I was a great visionary, but it does seem like I've done quite a few things earlier on than other people have done them. And yeah, you're right. It now just seems like it's obvious that you'd have a newsletter. But it wasn't that long ago.

Speaker 1 42:16

I'd meet people even in doing the same sort of thing I'm doing and they wouldn't have an email newsletter. They're just hoping people are going to know about what they're doing and it's like you say, it's like having a starting point for your art. Exactly Like if you're building up a good size newsletter and you're producing good work and you're doing an addition of 50 or 100, well, you only need a percentage of your newsletter You're starting from. Well, send that out to this number of people straight away, yeah, and then I'd imagine usually that sells and that's got more important as well, because you'll see a lot of people complaining about you know algorithms and, on the whole, if people sign up for your email, they do get it, and then whether they open it or whether gmail hides it in a different folder or something is another story, but overall it's the best way to sort of reach people, apart from obviously, like you say, creating good work and and now with the social media.

Speaker 1 43:16

But back then, how were you getting people to sign up to your newsletter? What was the? Were you giving them sort of, oh, you sign up to this and we'll give you this, or you don't think there was any like incentive? It was just sort of, I think, just letting people know why they're signing up, what they're going to get. So at the moment, I usually promote the email by telling them about my 24-hour art club, which is like the thing I do like every two or three months and then that's an affordable, mystery limited edition.

Speaker 1 43:45

I've got a piece of yours that I got from the very same thing 24-hour, yeah, yeah, but where did that idea come from? Because, again, that's genius you create this limited time. You're laughing, but I do think it's human psychology if people got what I've only got 24 hours, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I don't know what it is, but I better just get it because I've only got 24 hours. Yeah, that was just. Again, it was just. You can definitely overthink things and then you'd probably talk yourself out doing things. So it it was.

Speaker 1 44:10

If the 24 hour art club hadn't worked, no one would really remember it. But the idea actually came around and that was again like, where'd you get your inspiration from? You know, it came from Dollar Shave Club, which was like a business startup, and I remember just reading that and it just popped into my head like, because the idea was you signed up and you got fresh razor blades every month or whatever it was, and I didn't use it. I just came across the website or it was big in the news or something, but the idea instantly popped into my head of like art subscription, like art sent to you every month or something like that. Yeah, and then I just, oh, there's something there. But it was kind of half joking, like, oh, that would be funny to do something like that.

Speaker 1 44:49

And then I think I I very quickly was like, well, I'm going to try it. And then I don't remember exactly how I came up with the 24-hour premise or like that. But what have I got to lose? I'm going to do some small screen prints myself. I'm going to sell them for I think it was £24. It's available for 24 hours, just to make it like a funny little thing. But yeah, and it did work, like it wasn't huge numbers, it was probably 30 prints or something. But you know, I was printing them myself and this is going back maybe almost 10 years now. So at the time it was like, oh, that was fun, that was a success. And then so 10 years ago, you said you've been up in birmingham for 10 years.

Speaker 1 45:29

So when I was early on in birmingham, so what was the catalyst to move from Brighton to Birmingham? Well, I'd never been to Birmingham but me and my wife met. She went to university, at Sussex University. We met in Brighton. We both lived in Brighton for a few years, even after she left university, and then we visited Birmingham a few times and then there was just something about it where I was like I really liked the look of all the old warehouses, industrial areas and I thought, ah, this could be cool, I could have like my own gallery or a bigger studio and different things, because it was a lot cheaper.

Art as Business: Building an Audience

Speaker 1 46:05

Even though it's kind of changed a bit now, I think Birmingham's all caught up's. All those buildings have now been gentrified exactly. Yeah. Yeah, replaced with horrible red brick, yeah, and I think it was just. Maybe I just got a little bit bored of brighton and it was. It was difficult. It was always had like very small shared studio spaces where it's very limited in what I wouldn't be like casting resin or doing any big projects. There was always very small scale. So was that quite a key change in the work that you're producing? Probably, yeah, I've met really good people in birmingham.

Speaker 1 46:38

There's so many things about it that I love which I wasn't even aware of when I moved here, like casting the bronze and stuff like that's all done in birmingham, because it's got a big history of things like that and, yeah, it does seem to be a place filled with makers. You know it was, it was the heart. Yeah, we were the industrial revolution, you know. So it's still full of all these cool. It's funny. So I hadn't put that, I hadn't put the two into it till you just said it, the two and two together. Yeah, I mean, because you are essentially the mad magician product designer, maker, creator. Yeah, yeah, and birmingham was one of the hearts of, and that was, again, it was a happy accident. You know, I wasn't aware of all that history and then, as I came here, the more I learned about that and it was like wow, those people can do that, which then it allows your ideas to grow. Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there's a lot of good opportunity. And yeah, like, where I am now, a bigger industrial sort. And again, does that having the space, the simplicity of having a bigger space, to be able to, like, say, have a vending machine, a casting machine, 3d printers did that suddenly just go? Oh well, now I can get that, your first 3d printer. Yeah, I've got somewhere to work. I think, totally yeah, and I just met good people as well, like, made good friends that were had a similar mindset.

Speaker 1 47:54

I've got so many funny memories of us renting off this really dodgy landlord a whole floor of this building, and this was again going back probably nearly 10 years, renting this whole floor for like 300 pounds a month, wow, and we did that between five of us, so we were barely paying anything and we didn't even really have a use for it. I was doing a bit of art stuff but we were putting on event exhibition party. It was different. There wasn't it? As I said, the building spaces were very different. I had a space with two of my friends and we were paying the pennies for it, yeah, yeah, and thinking we were like, oh, it was so creative. Yeah, the landlord starts realizing the area is getting posher and posher, yeah, and like that's just something that I don't think in london and brighton you couldn't do anything like that. No, no, and maybe say, yes, I'd been in london.

Speaker 1 48:42

It would have just been very high pressure of, if I've got a big studio space, okay, I'm really gotta bring in serious money to make that work. Yeah, which when you're under pressure like that financial pressure, it's not the most conducive for creativity ideas. You might have ended up going no, I'll just do 500 prints a month, just yeah, I've got to churn out. But yeah, I think that's a common thing, isn't it like? If people want to pursue something creative or in the art, it's often thought or you've got to move to london, which there's part truth to that, but then, yeah, you're putting yourself under a lot of financial pressure. Maybe my advice would be, like, just move somewhere random. It's like, look, just just move somewhere, you know.

Speaker 1 49:25

Yeah, and was that a key trigger for you moving, to be able to expand the work to, yeah, I don't think like space to experiment and practice, and yeah, that just sort of happened. Like it wasn't like a great master plan set out, but yeah, that has happened. I was like, I think a lot of the times, the best things aren't a master plan exactly roll into it and go, well, this is working exactly. Yeah, were you doing things like the 24-hour art club when you're in brighton, or was that more of a? I'd say a lot. Yeah, I think all of that stuff happened when I was in birmingham, so it really was. Birmingham was like, right, not playing at this anymore, yeah, yeah, I'm gonna do it a bit more like you say, organized a bit more properly.

Speaker 1 50:04

Yeah, and then there was definitely a point I reached where I had sort of been scraping by for ages. And then I think I mentioned this to you before about after I'd moved to Birmingham I'd messed some stuff up like a tax thing, and then sort of a letter found its way to me and it was like oh, you owe £5,000 or something. Because I basically messed something up. And it was actually at that point where I was like I need to take this more serious. I need to sort of get my. Well, you've got a £5,000 tax bill to pay as well. I think it did. Actually, I don't think I had to pay it all in the end.

Speaker 1 50:38

It was like an accumulation of fines for like two or three years, but then, like you say, that being a catalyst to go right, I've got to turn this into something a bit more financial and turn this into something exactly. And looking back now, it was like at the time that was like the worst thing that could have happened. But looking back, it was also a thing that really sort of kicked me into gear and made me think right, yeah, let's. I think it's because a lot of people get brainwashed with the idea that you can't really have a successful career in the arts or if you want to do something creative, that's really nice. But again, that romanticized idea is oh, you're an artist that must be so beautiful, living off bread and water but creating what you really love, and it's yeah, yeah, no, I think that was it.

Speaker 1 51:22

I just sort of had a bit of a mindset shift and I thought, why do I want to just like struggle and scrape by? Because I always had that in my mind. I was like, oh, if I can just get by making stuff, I like making, that would be good enough. And then, yeah, I sort of just changed that to think, actually I want to do better at this. You know, I want to push it further. You can set your own target, you can set your own goal or you can, you can do anything you want to do, like sometimes you listen to these kind of invisible rules that aren't real.

Speaker 1 51:54

I think I had that idea of like, yeah, you're never going to really make much money. What was the turning point? What made you realize that actually maybe you can? Yeah, let me think, because I'm sensing that you, you had a natural business acumen and these skill sets. I think they've developed and I think you've got a much more business brain than, like you say, a lot of artists that I've met previously. Yeah, I think I definitely do, and my dad was originally a market trader, but he's always had fundamentals or, I guess, wheeling and dealing business skill which I've picked up or been inspired by, and selling, I guess, because I mean you could be the greatest artist in the world wheeling and dealing business skill which I've picked up or been inspired by. So I have selling, I guess, because I mean, yeah, you could be the greatest artist in the world, but if you can't sell what and maybe some artists or creators, like they, almost feel a sense of shame or you're sort of putting yourself out there, aren't you, by putting something for sale, and then it's that, oh, what if no one buys it, you know?

Speaker 1 52:47

So it's sort of if I don't put my stuff out there, I can't get hurt, kind of thing. But it's also, if you don't put your stuff out there, you can't pay your bills, exactly, yeah. So that is the thing, because I have had people say that before. It's like, oh, are you an artist or a businessman? And it's kind of well, you've got to take a bit of both, because if you don't do your art full time, you know, are you doing as much art as you want to do? You have to have another job that you don't necessarily like and you've never really had to balance those. You know, I've got to work in office by day and, yeah, resin cast by night and, to be fair, I actually remember when I was at college then, probably giving you like careers advice, and I thought, oh, I, I think I said, yeah, I'll just get any job and I'll just use that money to pursue what I want to do, which at the time was maybe a clothing brand idea, and then I think the teacher actually said to me oh, you'll find that if you work a normal job, full-time hours, you'll be so drained that you won't actually have any energy do what you want to do. But it's probably pretty good advice. Yeah, looking back and I can imagine that, yeah, so I've sort of been.

Speaker 1 54:29

I think my timeline has been very fortunate that I did all this experimenting and like messing around with stuff when I didn't really have a lot of expenses and stuff and responsibilities. Yeah, yeah, you could just sleep on the airbed on your brother's couch. Yeah, wing it a bit, exactly, okay. So how did you come to find the studio space in birmingham. Well, I've had a few in birmingham and then this one came up. I've been here about three years now and it was more money but a lot more space. I loved the look of the building. The location was near to where I live and I was just like, oh my god, yeah, it is very cool. Oh, thanks, yeah, and a accumulation of I mean, I'm guessing years and years of collect stuff. Yeah, yeah, books, memorabilia, all sorts of crazy stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but it must be a joy to come to work. I think that's it. Yeah, it's like it's creating a space that is gonna foster creativity and a space that you want to come to.

Speaker 1 55:32

Yeah, rather than sometimes I can let the space get like quite messy, like when I'm working on things and there's stuff everywhere, and even when it's like that I enjoy coming in left, but it's keeping a sense of order, I think really helps me. Yeah, it's basically lots of things that I've basically realized getting older. Is that all the things I resisted and thought as a kid? I agree. Now I'm like ocd. I need a plan, I need to do this, I need to be regimented, I need it goes against everything I used to stand for of like having a plan tidying up after yourself. But does that not make you more productive? Yeah, yeah, and I think it can relieve it's more of a business.

Speaker 1 56:11

Yeah, yeah, I think, being a few steps ahead, where I never used to be used to just be one idea at a time and then, okay, I've done that. Now, what am I doing? Whereas now I'm always, yeah, I've got a few moves ahead, or even at the moment, I've got most of the year probably planned out. Really, that's pretty amazing. Yeah, so it's like it's not all going to go to plan, things might get shifted around and whatnot, but it really helps you to sort of I don't know, it makes you a bit more comfortable rather than that feeling of like, what am I doing? What am I going to do now?

Speaker 1 56:43

Obviously, now we've said we're sat in a space that's full of 3d printers and gadgets and gizmos and pressure cookers and all sorts of stuff. What's the first exhibition landmark project since coming up to birmingham that you think has been sort of we need to know about, to see how you got to be here in birmingham. It does have its strengths and weakness of like you can actually sort of stand out a little bit more here Big fish, small pond A little bit, whereas I think in Brighton there was loads of people that moved there because they're creative or they like that kind of thing. So everyone you bump into is a photographer, a DJ, an artist Everyone does something Whereas in Birmingham, when I started doing stuff, people maybe took a little bit more interest in that. Or you do an exhibition and people say, oh, wow, this is cool. I've not been to anything like this before, whereas maybe in London you're a bit more spoilt for choice. If you try and do something there, you're competing against a thousand things that are happening on the same day.

Speaker 1 57:47

But at this point point you'd almost built a bit more of a global audience by the newsletter. Is that? Yeah, yeah, I mean, there's just several things that have happened over the years that one thing leads to another thing. And some people that bought some of my art I don't know how they came across me, to be honest, but then they had a little gallery in Paris and then they said, oh, do you want to do a little exhibition here? And then I did that. And then another guy that was French that would buy my art oh, I work for this TV station. Can we feature your exhibition? Can we do a little interview? And then I didn't even realize at the time, I wasn't sure the scope of it, but it was actually a real high profile art program that went out on the sort of national, yeah, sort of a main network over there.

The Move to Birmingham's Creative Scene

Speaker 1 58:34

Wow, that was shown like across all of France and Germany. So then it was suddenly yeah, it's like a huge amount of people in Europe. Did you notice that? An influx in, yeah, inquiries, emails, yeah, definitely, yeah, email lists and all those sorts of things. And then I would even have people that would say, oh, I bought this thing. Yeah, I saw you on TV in France. Wow, all these little things.

Speaker 1 58:57

What did you put into that solo show in Paris? A mix of things. Yeah, it would have been like crosses with pills, screen printed canvas. I think it was almost like just a little collection of things, an amalgamation of sort of all of the yeah that you'd produced. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And again, it was really fun and met some nice people.

Speaker 1 59:17

An in-view overview yeah, yeah, yeah, yes, I mean that does seem quite random, a bit lucky, but obviously someone has to have liked your work, yeah, to buy it to then go. By the way, we've got a little gallery in Paris. Would you like to come and see it? Yeah, I think sometimes that's the way. Maybe that's the way the world works the more you put yourself out there, the more people you meet. The harder I work, the luckier I get. Yeah, and it does seem like that because I've even got stuff. It's not definite yet, but I might do a little exhibition in vegas at the end of this year and which I'd really like to do. I really liked it there.

Speaker 1 59:51

Should we talk about some exhibitions, because the big one for you was death and taxes? Yeah, yeah, because this is a cool one. Your death and taxes exhibition great name for a start with and you held it in the city of london, right in the banking, yeah, yeah, area. So can you tell us a? What was the motivation behind the Death and Tax exhibition? Can you tell us a couple of the pieces that were in there? That yeah, yeah, sure, I really like doing exhibitions and I think it's important to present a whole collection of work with maybe like a theme, rather than just doing one release, one release, one release, and do you create with that in mind?

Speaker 1 1:00:26

Yeah, and I actually think that can encourage more creativity as well. Sometimes, once you know, okay, I'm going to do an exhibition, I'm going to theme it around this, maybe this is the name, at that point I sometimes start getting more ideas. And did you have the name death and taxes before? Is that how this? That was actually the name of the original grenade I did, which was like it's that famous quote, I think it's nothing's guaranteed other than death and fact one of the american presidents and then obviously the grenade. It represent both of those things destroyed money and a grenade.

Speaker 1 1:00:58

So, yeah, that london exhibition I had a lot of the ideas and it was a lot of work. It was. It was quite difficult and I did that all off my own back as well. So it wasn't I wasn't working with the gallery. That's a key feature, isn't it for you in terms of imbue the business. It's like you've you had people selling screen prints when you first started, but then you just weren't. Well, actually, if I take this all in-house, yeah, yeah, no commission, and I think that's just probably me being like maintaining control and that's important.

Speaker 1 1:01:24

Yeah, and when I did work with galleries as well, sometimes it's just very slow and they're taking a piece when they sell it. You invoice them, then you're waiting another. It's like more admin than it's worth it for the money, kind of thing. There's obviously still a big place for galleries and if there was a major gallery that wanted to do something, he'd work with them. But I think that was sort of on the cusp of people starting to just sell stuff themselves. And when I was doing that and selling work, there was kind of that thing like why do I need to get someone else to do the same thing? Because a lot of those galleries they were selling it on their website. They weren't even necessarily selling it in person. They're doing the same thing I'm doing and can do, but they're taking half the money and just and it's really filling their website with as many artists as possible, presumably. Yeah, yeah, you know it's like it's worth giving the gallery 50 if they're boosting your profile or they're introducing you to the right people and stuff. But yeah, that just came out of my own observation of I can do this myself and yeah, I've enjoyed doing that and it's just sort of I think it just works. Yeah, well, for me I think it definitely works. It's a great concept.

Speaker 1 1:02:34

So the death and taxes exhibition. Can you talk us through some of the pieces that were in there? Obviously you had the key piece in there. That's done the done the rounds, yeah, yeah. So I think the piece you're talking about is the bleeding cash machine. That's called Bleeding Me Dry, and that was a visual idea I had, because when I do an exhibition I quite like to have a kind of an installation piece that wouldn't it wouldn't necessarily be for sale or anything, and it's only going to. Really, you know, I don't think you'd want to have it in your house, but, yeah, like a nice sort of striking visual piece. And I had that idea, inspired by different things, but kind of, uh, stanley kubrick, the shine where I think the elevator and the blood comes out, and I just in my head I was like that would look really cool, a bleeding cash machine. So talk us through the process of that.

Speaker 1 1:03:22

Where does one find a cash machine? I mean, you're good at finding it. I mean you're, yeah, sourcing these A million pounds worth in shredded cash. An old cash machine, a vending machine? I mean you can find loads of things on the internet. It's always mad what people are selling, but yeah, it's funny. You say that because I think when I shared a video of that, it got millions of views. It's one of my most viral things and it viral thing and it got loads of comments funny comments, silly comment, like people that really loved it, and then a couple of people that were like, oh, that's not art, that's easy or something, but it was like it was actually.

Speaker 1 1:03:54

It took ages to make. You know, it's like sourcing those things and finding a cash machine. It came from up north somewhere, paying a guy to bring it down. It didn't have keys or anything like cutting it open, stripping the inside out and then it's fitting with a pump, testing different bloods and like the consistency this is like, because that's it isn't. It was a, it was a continuous pump, yeah, yeah. And then it went into a tray and then, yeah, I got a guy to make a custom fish tank that it would sit in. That was big enough so that I hoped the blood would just keep circulating, but it's still sort of splashed on the floor and stuff. So it was a really impractical piece but quite a, like you say, that statement piece that's going to make. Yeah, even if you don't remember anything, you're going to remember the cash machine spraying out blood, right, and I think that's why the video did well. It was like a really short clip, but it was just something that was very surreal for people to see and giving it that bleeding me dry connotation exactly, yeah, yeah. So what else was that? So that was your statement piece in death and taxes talk about. So, yeah, the main feature piece was the full-size human skulls that were cast with the shredded cash in.

Speaker 1 1:05:02

You're a hearse fan, yeah, yeah, I was gonna say, obviously you've got school. You know sex and death, isn't it? Apparently, all good art is about sex and death, according to damon hearst. It's a tricky one with hearst as well, because it's he's another one of those artists that he's done so much stuff and he's done so many things. It's hard to not touch on a theme. But again, that's the warhols, the basquiat. Yeah, how many people do we see now that are painting exactly like those people and think they're being innovative? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 1:05:28

But I also see the relation to Hearst as well, in terms of art as a business. I hope you don't take this personally, but Damien Hearst is very, very good at turning his art into a business. Oh, totally, I mean, look at his Henny editions and all these things now that he's doing. Well, he's probably one of the most successful. Yeah, him, jeff Koons, and they have lots of people working for them as well. It's not like they have teams of people helping them create, helping them do all these things.

Speaker 1 1:05:54

You're a one-man band, but the model that you've built feels similar. Yeah, yeah, and I've experimented with that and I've thought about do you want people helping you? Do you want people working? I, you want people work. I mean, obviously, like I was saying about the bronze casting, that's obviously someone else doing that. You know, I'm not doing that myself, but that's a separate thing. I'm not employing them.

Speaker 1 1:06:14

Do you cast a small bronze rabbits or do they do they do, though? Yeah, so I'll do the original design and 3d print the original thing and they'll basically turn it to bronze. Look at us. We've gone, jumped around again, away from the death and taxes to all these other things, to rabbits, to this, that and the other, but the death and taxes, you did the full-size skull filled with cash. That was.

Speaker 1 1:06:36

I think there was an addition of 50 of those and they were really hard to make. Again, like, where does one start with something like that. I know you've just well, I just thought I'd have a go and I'd try this, but you've explained to me the process of pressure casting these things and having to get them. Maybe that's it, though, maybe it being over optimistic. Maybe, if I was too sensible, would you say you're a little naive sometimes when you go into these projects, yeah, yeah and I think, oh, that'll be easy, that won't take long and everything.

Speaker 1 1:07:03

What was the biggest problem you had with us casting the skulls, with the cash? I mean, I didn't even calculate the volume of resin, but I knew, oh, I want to do full size ones, but it's kind of. It was about two liters of resin per one, so it's about the way about two kilograms, and the resin costs a lot, and then it means a huge amount of silicon for the mold and then you can only cast one at a time in the pressure chamber. Anytime you make something bigger. Well, for me anyway, it gets a lot more difficult, especially with something like that.

Speaker 1 1:07:34

And then, yeah, I guess it was that idea of doing pretty much everything myself and trying to get a whole exhibition together, but also rent the space and then also transport all the artwork, get it all online for sales. I basically doing every part of it myself, really. And how did that go? Did things sell at the exhibition, or was it more? People come in, they see it and go, wow, and then go and sort of explore you a bit more and, um, no, it was. It worked really well. It was like everything I made for the exhibition I sold amazing.

Speaker 1 1:08:05

Yeah, I couldn't have hoped for more than that really, but there was an element of this will be cool to do an exhibition in London, get it seen by a wider audience, and it did, didn't it? You've got quite a lot of press Artnet, guardian, yeah, yeah, some really good stuff, yeah, and I got some great visitors as well. Just nice people, just people coming through, and I guess by being in london, you've got a bigger network of people to tap into. Or there were people that were on holiday from other countries. Yeah, like a guy from la or something. He was in london, he's. Oh, I'd follow you on instagram. He came by, like I had people from paris and stuff. Get the train. That's a very cool thing, isn't it? Yeah, global audience and you can, yeah, yeah.

Death and Taxes Exhibition in London

Speaker 1 1:08:45

So what was the message that you were trying to convey when you were death, and taxes in the city of London. Yeah, I mean, it's a mixed one really. It's like I'm not anti-capitalist, which I think some people think I am, or some people are themselves. I mean, I am quite capitalist. I think. It's like you know, probably enough, one of the things I've actually written down I don't see you as anti-capitalist or anti-consumerism, more of a capitalist yeah, innovations and you're designing and you're trying to create new things and sell them on a market. Yeah, yeah, but I think it's one of those things that it's. It's such a fascinating thing the economy and money and it's misunderstood by everyone and it's like what are these people in london like, what are they doing and how do they control my life by adjusting some things and like it's always like changing the interest rates and suddenly we're all yeah, and then it triggers this and it's kind of it seems mad. But yeah, I think it's, whether you like money or don't like money, it affects everyone's life in different positive and negative ways, and that was part of the thing of doing that one in london.

Speaker 1 1:09:51

I was looking at london spaces and then I had the vague idea for that exhibition and then when I found this space. I was like, oh man, I can do it. Like right next to the bank of england. I just thought a bit like going all the way back to smuggling the drug vend onto the pier. It gave it a whole new impact. Where's this going to form the most traction? Yeah, impact, that's a great way to put it.

Speaker 1 1:10:12

And it was cool because I got people from the city of London that works there on their lunch break, wandering by and having a look and being kind of curious and confused. Were you surprised by some of the reactions? You got to the work or or what? Were there any people that came in and were like, oh my god, this is insane, what are you doing this here? I think there's some people that was like maybe they just didn't even really know what it was. If it's just someone that's they work in an office and they're on their lunch break having a wander around, they don't even really know what they've walked into. Yeah, yeah, there was definitely a lot of confused people, I'd imagine so. And then they see this cash machine spraying out exactly yeah, yeah. And then I did have some people say, oh yeah, someone from my office said you've got to come check this. That was quite cool, yeah, but I think it gives it that different level.

Speaker 1 1:11:04

Doing it in the city of london, an exhibition called death and taxes yeah, yeah, it was like, yeah, right at the heart of it, and that cash machine actually ended up in it's. It's got somewhere exciting to go next. But it went to glastonbury as well, didn't it did? Yeah, yeah, and that was fun. People got slightly confused in their festival states, right, yeah, yeah, so in cash machine, I got invited to take it there and it was cool as well because the area it was in each year they have a theme and this sort of slotted right into that. And they built almost a fake little high street and different artists created little fake shops or window displays and things like that. So they built a little section to have the cash machine in the kind of the fake high street bank.

Speaker 1 1:11:47

And yeah, you had people from I swear it seemed like half a mile away. They see bank and they see the illuminated cash machine sign and they're making the trek to it and then when they get there, they're just like what is going on? Yeah, cash points prime to go in and it's just a cash machine spurts you out. Yeah, you had a bit of a technical issue, though, with your cash machine there, didn't you? Yeah, yeah, it was like I mean nice to be there, but it was really hot and sunny that weekend, so I was like I'll just leave the cash machine running because people are up all night and it'll be fun for people to see it at different, you know, mental states. Yeah, I can imagine the people at three, four, five. Yeah, they're like what, and then, yeah, but when I went back in the next morning and checked it, it was just that all the blood had evaporated. Really, yeah, god, trying to find watered down blood in glastonbury and stuff like that. Yeah, well, you've actually just told me today. But it's going somewhere even more exciting, right? Yeah, it's going in a little group exhibition at sarcha gallery, which is anyone creative will know who mr sarchie is. Yeah, yeah, that's quite a big accolade for you, right? Yeah, I'm really excited about that. That's cool.

Speaker 1 1:12:52

Do you know anything more about the show? It's about maybe 15 or so artists under a theme. Is it curated? Yeah, I mean, I should probably know all this, and I think it's called past future and it is about ideas where the future might be. Where will the future lead us. Yeah, uh, what is next for you? I mean, you're continuing to release lots of editions of your work. Is it just on to the next idea? On to the next idea? Oh, I've got this gallery show to deal with. Yeah, I think I'm always trying to reinvent things and I'm always trying to think fun, like when I've been doing the 24-hour art club. I've been doing like puzzles and interactive things where people come across something and it leads them to a website again.

Speaker 1 1:13:37

This is another brilliant marketing tool, because you cast the bronze rabbits, don't you? We spoke about it briefly before. You follow the white rabbit and you find imbue, but obviously we've got again 90s, 2000s references, the matrix yeah, totally, all those things influence, big influence. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think that's probably. Is that where the rabbits came from? No, I'm trying to think with the rabbit, it's more so sorry, we should explain that imbu creates these bronze rabbits and whenever you're traveling around the place or you're off in italy or france, or the louvre or anything, you, you hide these and you post little coordinates of, yeah, there might be. It's like almost like a treasure hunt. Yeah, so it's like I made an edition of them. I've never sold them and that comes from.

Speaker 1 1:14:20

I used to always like hiding little thing, whether it was just like sticker packs or doing little art drops whenever I went anywhere, and I thought it'd be nice to have a kind of a bespoke thing that I could hide when I'm traveling. So, yeah, I came up with a rabbit and yeah, I guess it's Alice in Wonderland, the Matrix, even magic, like the rabbit out of a hat. So it's just an internationally known great symbol. How many have you hidden, do you reckon so far? Do you know? Symbol? How many of you hidden do you reckon so far? Do you know? Uh, yeah, so I made a hundred and then I've hidden. I think the other day I hid 57.

Speaker 1 1:14:53

Where were you? You were. You went somewhere the other day and hit one, didn't you? Yeah, I did one in london, london, and then I actually did one in blackpool as well. Blackpool, that was that. Was it the random one I spotted? Yeah, yeah, random, but but again, they've been all over the world with you, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I've done them in lots of europe, america, and it's cool to like each place has people are perceptive to them in different sort of amount. When I did them in france, like whether it's because of the, I just have a lot of followers in france and possibly because of that, I guess. So, yeah, and I like to think as well because, like the Parisians, I like their attitude and they like art and there's a lot of street art there and they have that same kind of attitude of just doing stuff. Yeah, we'll do it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But yeah, when I was hiding them in Paris, it was like I had people hot on my heels following where I was going, trying to preempt where I was going to drop the next one.

Speaker 1 1:15:50

When you do the bronzes, have they got presumably imbuesourcecom on? They just got at imbue and then a unique number. I was going to say so. It's a unique piece of art, but it always leads them back to finding you as well. It's like we were talking previously about films, matrix being a big influence to you.

Speaker 1 1:16:12

Those rabbits are like a little easter egg that you find in. You know, previous photographer, I was talking to you. I was talking about hitchcock movies, where they always used to have these tiny little easter eggs. Yeah, they knew about and yeah, I love stuff. Same same for you. It's like I'm gonna go and put this tiny bronze rabbit somewhere really crazy, on the top of a phone box, in the middle of you know whatever. I think, yeah, there is something special about that. It's giving people an experience as well, because, for example, say that I decided to do them as an edition, someone could buy one and then they receive it and they put it on their shelf. But I think having the story that goes with it is what makes it really special.

Speaker 1 1:16:46

Have you done any other rabbits apart from the bronze ones, within exhibitions or editions or anything, or is it only the bronze? I've done some resin like colored resin, one and I did those as a little box on the website with the idea of you get two and you keep one and you hide one, to kind of encourage the trend. But yeah, I don't think it has the same magic as, no, the bronze ones, and I think it's that whole people know that you've left it. Yeah, yeah, oh, he's been here. Yeah, he's dropped this rabbit. He's left this here intentionally. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And and yeah, like, I've had some really nice messages of people that have found it and I even made a friend with one guy that I'd hidden one.

Speaker 1 1:17:25

But yeah, it's like it developed some interesting stories and I like to think it's something that if you get out there and people are looking where I've dropped one, because it's not I don't do it all the time, you know, I've done those 50, probably taking like a couple of years now yeah, it's like, I think, when people actually get out there and find it and then they've got to like run around the street and maybe climb up something such a buzz, yeah, and it adds they've got that story attached to it. Experience, like, yeah, it's an experience attached with art, yeah, yeah, which I think is an interesting idea, especially in terms of a marketing ploy. That sounds a bit wrong in terms of a marketing tactic. Yeah, yeah, because there's lots of these. You're, you are kind of a natural marketer in a way, and is that just because you've been surrounded by pop culture, advertising, I guess? So, yeah, we're. It's so ingrained in all of us that I think, as well, I just do stuff that I would like to experience. Yeah, if you know what I mean. But, like, if someone else was doing the rabbits or something like that, you'd like to be following one. I'd be following it and I'd be like, oh, I really want to go. Yeah, are there any other artists, creators, any people doing those sorts of things? And you've thought that is a genius idea. I wish I'd come up with that one. Oh, yeah, all the time. Any examples? Yeah, there definitely is. I'm trying to think now there's one guy on instagram. I've never met him or spoke to him, but he does these really cool. Again, it's a mix of things. It's like it's in the real world. He'll scan and sometimes 3d print something that kind of hard to explain, like it might be like a uh statue, that's like missing the hand or something, and he'll re-sculpt that and then add it back onto the statue. Oh, and then people go and find them and they've got a little qr code. Interesting, he does loads of different things. It's like they're only 3d prints, but it's the same kind of treasure hunt thing. But then the way he presents the video is like really well executed.

Speaker 1 1:19:19

And with your work, there is that element of technology. Isn't there? The qr codes, the links? You've got 3d printers galore.

Speaker 1 1:19:26

Did incorporating technology into your work allow you to take the ideas to a next level? Yeah, I think so, and I think it's just the curiosity of it because, like when I've got the first 3d printer. I think it was around this sort of time where the technology had just gone a little bit mainstream and become really affordable. So I bought a 3d printer and it was literally like a few hundred pounds direct from china. You had to build half of it yourself and I had no idea what I was doing and it took so long to get a print that actually came out, because it's quite experimental, especially back then, and, yeah, I couldn't really do that much with it. I didn't have loads of 3d sculpting skills or anything, but I just sort of learned it.

Speaker 1 1:20:12

And then, yeah, and do you think getting into that in the early days of it becoming a thing helped you going? Well, I've seen it from what it was. Oh, now this new print has come out and you can use this plastic string that you just feed into it or whatever that might be to make it more efficient, I think so yeah, I think, like for anyone really, it's just like have a go at stuff, because it's so easy to think you'll be intimidated by things, and I felt a bit like that. I don't know how a 3d printer works, I don't know anything about that, but it was kind of I just had a go and then that led to something and I think that probably led to the mary cola bottle. So that was some talk to us about the, the mary cola.

Technology and Tools in Artistic Creation

Speaker 1 1:20:52

Yes, I've done a few versions of that, but the very first one was I made it on the computer there's a digital model and then I managed to 3d print a version and then I used different technique again. Looking back at it now, I'd be like I could do it better now, yeah, but at the time I was really happy with it. And then, yeah, so I I 3d printed a version, I think, sort of varnished it to get it glossy, made a mold of that and then cast that in resin which I'd got the color to look like coca-cola. And it was similar to the facebook cross where you had that silhouette of mary, which is very iconic, with the iconic silhouette of the coke bottle, and it was just kind of two well-known objects that sort of seamlessly went together. But yeah, that came from 3d printing and from testing and having a new tool which gave me thought, oh, I could make something like that now.

Speaker 1 1:21:50

And tools are important to you, aren't they? Like? I mean, you've just shown me the most incredible uv printing machine. Yeah, I was like, wow, this is amazing. I'm sat as I say, I'm looking at four high-end 3d printers here. It's obviously the technology is important and grown, but then presumably that allows you to create a slightly more elaborate edition of something or an elaborate idea that presumably then you can sell for a bit more, which then allows you to maybe think, well, now I can afford a, like I say, uv printer or the next. I think that's it. Yeah, one thing leads to another thing and then a new tool unlocks new capabilities or unlocks new ideas. What's been the biggest unlock for you? Do you think, in terms of that context, in terms of tools that you've got, that's gone. Wow, I don't have to now go to that place and wait, however long.

Speaker 1 1:22:41

Yeah, I guess 3D printing that's really been a big thing, but it's quite funny because the 3D print is never actually the finished thing. It's just sort of like a tool to maybe create the master, which you would then create a mold from things like that. But I guess it's just a bit of everything You're always learning and I guess I've forgotten all the things that I have learned where at one point I couldn't do all these things, but just by experimenting and testing out different things every day, things like the pressure casting of the skulls. That is such a yeah, how did you? Um, so you can cast resin without one of those, but you get more detail and then when you're doing clear resin, you need the pressure casting.

Speaker 1 1:23:27

So I think I was making something else ages ago and I couldn't get. I was getting air bubbles and I was getting bits that weren't casting properly. So I had to buy one of the pressure casting, but at the time I really didn't want to. It felt like a really boring way and I'm guessing that's just a research thing. You know, yeah, yeah, why am I getting foggy in this resin? That's just a research thing. You're like, oh my God, why am I getting foggy in this resin? That's it. Yeah, like YouTube, searching on forum people talking about different things.

Speaker 1 1:23:53

So then, yeah, getting one of the pressure casting things and then realizing, oh, now I've got that I can do this, or I can get clear resin and get it without air bubbles. It really is sort of like stepping stone. Like you say, one tool, one machine elevates the next piece of work. Yeah, to allow you to potentially buy something else and we'll elevate you further and I guess there's an element of if I'm doing something or I'm maybe coming back to an idea, or, like the crosses with the pills in, I'm generally like doing a new one of those each year with a different color and a different style. But I was just showing you earlier some prototypes of the little pills that I'm going to print on and it's that kind of idea of like how do I kind of improve it or how do I take it to the next level?

Speaker 1 1:24:38

So what was the project that made you buy a UV printer? And can you explain to Joe Public, because I was a bit like what? How does it do that? Yeah, it's kind of like an inkjet printer but you can put uneven things in it and all different wood, metal, glass, plastic. It'll basically print on anything and it sort of sprays ink and it uses a UV light to cure the ink as soon as it goes on there. So it comes out instantly dry.

Speaker 1 1:25:05

But it's something I've got because it's good for lots of different things, like the wooden boxes. I can print on those. But it's again, it is one of those things where I'm like I wonder if I could print on pills. But I tested that the other day and it might not have worked, but it's that idea of just like, well, I'm gonna give it a go and it did work. Yeah. Then it's like I've unlocked a new tool and a new element. I can level boss is opened. Yeah, defeated the end level boss, you can move on to the next. Why don't? I feel like, with all this sort of 90s paraphernalia, that's quite a good reference for you onto the next end of level boss. Yeah, get the new machine you can now. And I think that's it. It keeps. That's what keeps it exciting for me and that's what hopefully keeps it in the exciting for the viewer.

Speaker 1 1:25:49

And sometimes I've thought that would I like to be an artist that just sort of has their thing and they just do that. And then there's some part of me maybe not as much now, but I used to think I really wish I had something like that. But now I think, especially for me, maybe not for everyone, but I would get really bored. I think I do sort of have that. It just comes naturally, I think. But yeah, I will try stuff doing the video, doing the photography, doing the 3d printing, casting, you know. So come on then.

Speaker 1 1:26:13

Well, because you, as I say, you've done no long form interviews. You've got had your art on your press, yeah, but imbue it's not your real name. Yeah, is anonymity. Was it just a cool thing to do back then? I think it was quite. It obviously came through from, yeah, the whole street art thing and that's what everyone was doing where it was. You were using a different, like a moniker or a different name and you just everyone was sort of anonymous. Really. Did you like that? Yeah, like there wasn't really any need for me to not be anonymous.

Speaker 1 1:26:47

I was doing more things like little interventions or doing pay stuff and stuff like that. Yeah, and the drug vending machine, exactly, yeah, and all those things, and I didn't really have any interest in putting myself out there. It was more just putting the work out there, which is still the case, really. But I think, yeah, only very recently I've sort of gone in front of the camera. Yeah, because avid followers of you will realize that recently you have started producing these beautiful videos in the studio. I just wondered what was the catalyst behind that.

Speaker 1 1:27:17

Again, that's still something I'm sort of experimenting with exactly how the video should be and showing more process stuff, but I definitely reached a point where I was trying to make videos showing what I'm doing or working on something, and it's sometimes quite tricky to do that or it's less engaging for people if you're not talking on it. So I guess I just like bit the bullet and was just like Did you find that pressure? Yeah, yeah, and I think probably for most people, I don't really think there's anyone that's like oh, I love talking on camera, I love my own boy. Oh man, it's been a learning curve for me, yeah, but I've found it quite liberating and quite enjoyable. Have you found that it's opened you up to a newer audience? Maybe just to people? Maybe I think that will come.

Speaker 1 1:28:02

I think, as I do more videos and put more, because there is that old adage again, people will be sick of me saying this, but people buy from people, yeah, yeah. So, yeah, I think there is something about the personal element of and again going back to the rabbits, it wouldn't be the same if you just did a batch load and go anyone can buy these. Yeah, yeah, personal little elements of, yeah, having that connection and understanding of it, maybe this understanding a little bit more about your journey, your motivations behind things and, yeah, why you create, how you create god. We need a four hour long documentary about how you create. This is it's mind-blowing, people. But what's next for you then, sir?

Speaker 1 1:28:38

You said that you were sort of a year ahead in terms of your ideas. Where are we then from here? What's the? Yes, I've got a few. I'll have a few more releases over the next few months and then I'm pretty much planning to do an exhibition at the end of May. Where would you like to do that? That's going to probably be something I'm doing in Birmingham and I've got a lot of good ideas for that and a lot of stuff I'm excited about, and I'm wanting it to be quite like an immersive experience. Um, okay, so more an immersive show that's centered around what any themes you've done death and taxes in the past you've done.

Speaker 1 1:29:17

Yeah, it's kind of themed around technology, which sounds very open and vague, but I've done some stuff in the past with printed circuit boards. There's a little one on the wall there, that $100 bill, so they're actually real circuit boards, because I've always liked the look of circuit boards. As far as I know, I've never seen anyone using them to actually produce an image. So I've done some before with the currency, which was obviously inspired at the time by cryptocurrency and moving online. But I've done some. Well, I've done one which was the famous painting girl with a pearl earring, and I really liked how that came out. And ever since I made that that was quite.

Speaker 1 1:29:58

That was probably about five, six years ago I wanted to do an exhibition with a whole lineup of famous paintings and it was kind of that idea of how everything's digital now and like a lot of people might not have seen the original painting but they'd just seen a representation of it, but yeah, so other stuff kind of in that vein and I'll have, hopefully, all the 3d printers, their printing stuff, oh, within the exhibition. Yeah, yeah, cool, um, and then I'm doing I scanned a statue in the loo. There's a video on my instagram. I'm talking about stealing a statue, yeah, so it was kind of like a tongue-in-cheek bit of a joke, like a digital theft, a bit like those old when we were growing up. It was like, you know, internet piracy and downloading music, and so it's sort of like a joker, like downloading artworks and then printing one for yourself at home. So I scanned that, tweaked it on the computer and 3d printed it, and then I've been using this new software to divide it up into smaller chunks so that I can essentially 3d print a full-size copy of that one.

Speaker 1 1:31:04

So the original you printed was quite a small scale. Yeah, just trying to explain. And now you've upscaled that massively and done some clever. It's going to be, yeah, about two meters tall, clever calculations of how to, yeah, and it's slowly working away at printing each one of these individual blocks. Yeah, it's like 160 part. Wow, we'll all come together and make this two meters. And then you said when you've done that, will that be used to make a mould or will that be used as a final piece? This is just for the exhibition, almost just as kind of like a demonstration of the idea of scanning something and printing your own version. Yeah, very cool.

Future Projects and Final Thoughts

Speaker 1 1:31:41

Do you think there's anything that we haven't spoken about you think we probably should have? There's probably so much on your journey in the art world that we haven't spoken about, but are there any key moments that we've missed or things you'd like to speak about? I think we've kind of covered a lot of it. Yeah, okay. Well, if we've covered a lot, then the next thing that we do is we've got a closing tradition on the creative noah land podcast is that we'd like an inspiring quote from you, sir, and also a guest of someone in your network that you think would be an inspiring guest to come on to the creative noah land podcast. Okay, um, in any order you like. Yeah, I think, for the quote.

Speaker 1 1:32:19

I've always thought about this one. I thought it's quite funny, uh, kind of the way I operate, but I guess it maybe could come across a little bit arrogant, but it was the painter chuck close and he said inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show up and do the work. And I think I've kind of always tried to take that approach of like I just come into the studio and I just get on with it and think of stuff and make stuff. It's not about waiting for inspiration, yeah, yeah, I think that's it. Maybe some people think being when I just get on with it and think of stuff and make stuff, it's not about waiting for inspiration to strike. Yeah, I think that's it. Maybe some people think, oh, when I just get that big idea, then I'll do it, then I'll make something, and then you might just be waiting forever, forever and ever. I kind of that's one of my philosophies, or what I would say to anyone that wants to do something, is just do it, you know, know, give it a go. And off the back of that question I've got another one have you, have you ever created something that you thought was just fucking brilliant and it's just flopped? Probably, yeah, there's something that just thought, oh, this, I really get this, but then it just didn't connect.

Speaker 1 1:33:21

I feel like I do usually have a good idea of, like, how well something will be received. Have there been any surprises that have been, oh, that's all right, but then have gone through the roof? Then maybe the opposite, everything sells out in view. So I think, yeah, I I am conscious that, like, when I do do a release, I am lucky that it does sell out, but I think that, sort of calculated from I know how big to make the addition size, so I'm never gonna, I don't want to make huge addition just because, like, maybe I could sell a few more.

Speaker 1 1:33:53

I'm quite happy to keep it limited and for it to sell out and I guess, yeah, I think I do have a good eye for something of. Is that a good object? Is that something people would actually want to own and put on their shelf or on their wall. So not that I'm an expert, but but I think that's quite important, isn't it? Yeah, I don't think I'd put something out there thinking, because I think I would know myself, even if it was a cool idea at the end of the day, for the commercial side of what I'm doing, like I might do, like I said, an installation for an exhibition that doesn't need to sell it's not for sale but is that where you get your chance to maybe experiment and do something really fun? When I think so, yeah, yeah, like, I've done a few things like that. I've got that church arcade there, where it's sort of a church altar with a retro arcade built in. Yeah, and that was for an exhibition, and that was yeah. Again, that was just something I wanted to do and I thought it was fun, but that goes down to the same.

Speaker 1 1:34:49

We're in the studio. People won't be able to see this, but there's a an old arcade basketball machine in the corner, which is genius, and that was the thing that inspired the yeah, that's true. Actually, yeah, the moon basketball. So imbu's got a load of basketballs with moon crater stuff all over them that were equally as cool, but you just wanted a cool basketball for your machine. Right, that was it. Yeah, I thought it would be cool to do that for the basketball machine, and then it was kind of.

Speaker 1 1:35:11

I think my friend actually said, oh, you should do an additional um, and then, yeah, I think that kind of goes back to that. Yeah, you should make stuff that you want. Yeah, I mean, don't try and maybe second guess it, or what would you do? Seem to have that a very good gauge, a good barometer of. Yeah, I think we can work on it as well, though, and it's sort of it's maybe not even just a piece, it's like all the stuff that comes with it and the packaging and the certificate, and I think it's just a case of trying to do a really good job and making it desirable in all of the aspects. Yeah, it's just a tiny yeah sculpture. Whatever you get the certificate, you some stickers, you get a useful box, because I like buying different things.

Speaker 1 1:35:49

I mean, a lot of the stuff I've got here is just random stuff, but that's what's brilliant. You've got random stuff a big Lebowski skateboard with loads of album covers, with books about protest T-shirts and, as I say, matrix dolls from one of your favourite films, stanley Kubrick, icon stuff. Yeah, I think that's it. It's a treasure trove of ideas. This studio, it's being surrounded by, yeah, things you like and you find inspiring. Do you think that's important? You wouldn't have just a plain white studio? No, I don't think so.

Speaker 1 1:36:19

Yeah, I really like that kind of you have to immerse yourself in the ideas yeah, yeah. And then immerse yourself in the ideas yeah, yeah. And then, yeah, I think there's loads of books which they've just built up over years and again, they're not just all art books. There might be books on advertising, books on packaging, magic book, street art book, it's just all sort. It's like I can just pull out one of these books, yeah, flick through and well, we talk a lot about the outputs. Uh, a result of the inputs, exactly. So if you're only inputting one thing, yeah, yeah, and there'll be stuff in those books where it'll be like packaging, design, and then maybe that's inspired one of the things I've made, like boxes for pills and things like that, yeah, so the inspiration comes from everywhere. It's not really just from an advertising background. So I, I see it all.

Speaker 1 1:37:05

Yeah, exactly, I think I'd find advertising more fascinating, probably, than art, and there was a golden era where it was very artfully done. Funnily enough, we were only saying in one of the last podcasts I did with Tim that that's the reason I got into photography the big Guinness adverts. You produce one image and that's going to be the statement image, whereas now we're in content land and yeah, yeah, that's a whole different podcast. Yeah, yeah, I think that's it. There's so much out there now, isn't? There's a saturated with content? Do you think that makes it? I mean, obviously, that makes it more difficult. So are you happy that you've built your following and built your newsletter and email lists prior to all that? Really, yeah, I guess. So, yeah, because I'm trying to get noticed now it's very difficult.

Speaker 1 1:37:56

It's sort of a bit of both, isn't it's a double-edged sword of it's like the best time ever to try and do something and put something out there, but also maybe one of the most competitive times. Yeah, I don't know what the answer is. I don't know. I think, like you said, I think the best answer is just to just keep doing what you love. Yeah, yeah, I think that's, yeah, yeah, but you do seem like you've got yeah, you've got the, the dream. You've definitely got the dream studio for me. There's just stuff everywhere and stuff. I'm I'm just oh, thank you blown away by I think.

Speaker 1 1:38:28

Yeah, it's the accumulation of I don't even know 10 studios, or like going from, like my bed in a studio flat, from the blow-up bed in your brother's yeah, it's like that was the first one. Then I had my own studio flat and I had a little window sill where I could like paint with the window open, and then shared studio, another shared studio, like getting a little bit better each time, and that's it. It's like you say you have to be surrounded by those things. The inputs, yeah, yeah, as we said, there's a book of british birds next to a book of david trigley's posters next to an old projector next to, yeah, card tricks and sculptures of hamburgers and cartoon characters and all just like absolute crazy stuff, which I'll try and get a few bits in the show notes if we can. It's a balance of like collector and hoarder, yeah, but I think that's great because, like you say, you can have those moments where you go God, I've even forgot, I've got that, yeah, yeah, and it suddenly triggers an idea for something else.

Speaker 1 1:39:24

Yeah, okay, so we've done the quote Chuck Close, who is someone in your network that you think would be an interesting guest. I haven't checked with them yet but I'm going to say my good friend, very good artist and very funny person Fockle how would we describe him? A bit more militant activist, guerrilla artist, just a great guy, very funny. Yeah, we met by chance when I said we had that floor in that building. It was really cheap Him and one of my other friends, which I didn't know them at the time. They moved in next door so we got to know them.

Speaker 1 1:40:01

Cool, and that's again just chance encounter kind of thing. We've inspired each other. Yeah, definitely, I can see that coming across in of. Again just chance encounter kind of thing. And we've inspired each other. Yeah, definitely I can see that. Yeah, coming across in both. Yeah, he does a lot of good stuff and it's just, it's so funny some of the stuff he's got a great mind. Yeah, but probably good that it's a recorded only podcast for him, because he is a bit more the anonymity. Yeah, but that'll be a, that'll be a great guest and, fingers crossed, he says, yeah, I'm sure he will, I'm sure he will.

Speaker 1 1:40:26

Anyway, for now, imbue, thank you very much for doing the creative no one podcast. It's been very interesting and this is going to be I mean, god, it's going to be a lot of people wanting to get the first long form interview of yeah, of imbue and behind the mind. So I'm very glad that you chose or I was persistent enough to bully you into coming. Good thanks, mate, appreciate it. Nice one. Thank you into coming to the Creative Nobler Land podcast. Good Thanks, mate, appreciate it, nice one. Thank you for listening to the Creative Nobler Land podcast.

Speaker 1 1:40:53

If you found anything inspiring or useful in this episode, please consider subscribing or maybe sharing the episode with a friend. Anything you can do to help promote and support Creative Nobler Land is so beneficial and I really appreciate it. Check out the website and sign up to the newsletter to be the first to know of everything that's going on here in Creative Noblerland. Thanks again for listening and until next time, explore, inspire and create Better. To have a short life that is full of what you like doing in a long life spent in a miserable way, and so, therefore, it's so important to consider this question. What do I desire you?