Nettle Grellier in her studio, photo courtesy of Nettle Grellier
Damaris Athene: Nettle, can you tell me a bit about yourself?
Nettle Grellier: I’m from Stroud and both my art and my parents are artists. I grew up with that in my life and now me and all my siblings are in the arts. I was born in 1993. I'm 27. I studied at Kingston University, and then at Brighton University. Since studying I've lived in Spain, which was really great, and I exhibited there a lot. I ran a residency there as well, in Granada, and now I'm down in Cornwall.
DA: Can you tell me a bit about your practice?
NG: I do figurative oil paintings. They’re colourful, a combination of fluorescent-y colour schemes mixed with more natural earthy tones. They usually have one, two or three figures interacting with each other, and within quite dry, arid landscapes. Humour is important, the grotesque nature of being a human is important to me, and colour is important to me. *laughs*
DA: With the colour, that's quite a contrast between the fluorescence and the natural. What do you want to bring by using those colours?
NG: I think it's to do with when I lived in Spain, because there was this heat that was always present and then also living in Cornwall. The light here is just something that has always drawn artists. At one point I went through an earthy purple with bright yellows and bright oranges phase. That's definitely from springtime in Cornwall when the gorse flowers are coming out and there are little purple flowers around them. It’s often taken from my environment, but then I'm also just really attracted to a highlighter orange next to an earthy brown. I like to put a bright ground onto the canvas before I start painting because then anything you put over the top, it's such high contrast.
DA: Yeah, it makes it vibrate. It's quite amazing. I hope I can see your paintings in the flesh sometime I’ve only ever seen them digitally.
NG: Yeah. That’s something obviously I can't fucking wait for, seeing work in the flesh. I don't know what it's done to everybody's practices only exhibiting online for a year. It's something I've always worried about, making sure that the quality of the works stand up on its own beyond being in a little photograph.
DA: Yeah, I think it can be a real danger. On Instagram it’s so tiny and you're also constantly looking at an image that's got light projecting through it. It’s never going to be the same. With your work I notice a digital/synthetic influence coming into the natural colours.
‘The Weed Puller’ 2020, Oil on Canvas
25cm x 20cm & 28cm x 35.5cm
Photo courtesy of Nettle Grellier
NG: I'm sure my use of colour is also influenced by Instagram. I also really like 70’s colour combos. I really love the old TfL fabrics. I love it when it's slightly jarring or shouldn't work that way. That's something that I want to try harder at in my own painting. I'm always so worried about my work being naff.
DA: In my opinion, it's definitely not naff!
NG: Thank you. That's really nice.
DA: I think there's a lot of stuff out there that is that you see on Instagram. I can understand the fear, but you are miles apart from that. Miles!
NG: Sometimes it's verging on the edge, I throw a lot of stuff away. It's interesting to see what is really popular on Instagram in the art world, and important as an artist to remember to see beyond that and to have a more long term idea of what you're doing.
DA: No, definitely. If you look at a lot of the artists who have the most followers on Instagram, it's off the scale of naff. That's what's popular. I think you've got to try stay true to yourself and try ignore that.
NG: It's interesting. It’s a hard balance to strike between running yourself as a business so that you can afford to keep making art and earn a living, and falling into that horrible trap of the internet and Instagram. I've definitely experienced a bit of a decline in my Instagram recently and whilst I know that it doesn't matter, sometimes it makes me feel shit.
DA: But then the change in the algorithm that happened recently, it's made a huge difference, particularly to creatives that aren't pushing for sales. They really like accounts that sell stuff.
NG: You have to bear that in mind don't you, so that you're like, that's not about me.
Currently Untitled, part of a series of A5 drawings for 'In Heat' with Plum Cloutman at Blue Shop Cottage 5th-12th May
Photo courtesy of Nettle Grellier
DA: Yeah, exactly. Do you manage to completely support yourself by making work?
NG: Yeah, I mean, I've definitely needed the government grants this year, which luckily I was eligible. But I don't have any other jobs.
DA: That's amazing!
NG: I think partly that's because I've chosen to live in cheaper ways as well. I lived in a truck for five years, didn't really pay much rent didn't have bills, so I could afford to rent a good studio. Recently it's been more difficult. That's one of the reasons why I just sacked in the studio for a bit. I could do a drawing project for a while to keep myself afloat with the support pledge and then also use that time to get out of the stagnant funk that I was starting to feel myself heading towards in painting.
DA: Was that a funk that was pandemic related, or would it have happened anyway, or is it too hard to untangle those two things?
NG: I think it is hard to untangle those two things. At this time of year I always struggle the most, but it was financial pressures too. I probably could have got through the next six months, but I would have been stressed and that might not have been that productive. I had a flat before I moved down here that I was renting through an estate agent. It's such a commitment and it's so expensive. I've been so lucky that I've managed to avoid that for such a long time. But bloody hell, it completely changes things.
DA: That's amazing that you avoided that for so long.
NG: Yeah, well you've gotta live in a truck for five years, which has its own downsides.
DA: How was that?
NG: It was a really amazing thing to do in Spain because there's more space and it's more acceptable. It allowed me to do lots of things like run a residency, travel about, experience a bit of after university time where I could be a bit more carefree. Coming back to England in it was a lot harder. I found it isolating after a while because with a big vehicle like that you have to be in very rural places. For me was too much of a hermit-y life and it made me quite unhappy. I was making quite a lot of work about being isolated, like two years ago, which now a lot of people are doing. Maybe that's also partly why I'm feeling quite stagnant, because I've done that theme.
‘Don’t Be Funny’ 2020, Oil on Canvas
28cm x 25.5cm
Photo courtesy of Nettle Grellier
DA: Has the pandemic changed how you work?
NG: Well definitely at the moment because I'm not painting at all. My mum's an artist and regularly she’s taken a few months just to do drawing to get out of a rut. That's why I'm doing it. I've become more confident in the last year, because I was in a bit of a bad place last couple of years. This year, for me has been quite transformative anyway, regardless of the pandemic. Hopefully my work has been reflecting that I feel more confident about who I am. Things like humour are an important part of that.
DA: I've noticed that progression in your work and I absolutely love the humour. I think it takes a journey to get to the point where you feel comfortable doing that. I find that within myself, my younger self wouldn’t have had the confidence to use humour.
NG: Yeah, I don't know if you can when you're young because you need to be a bit bit older and more embittered. *laughs*
DA: *laughs*
NG: But also if you're young and you're making work that's just funny you might not get taken seriously. I don't sell as much work now as I did before, because it's a more specific taste. It's definitely more me so it's important to keep doing it. I wouldn't have been able to support myself off this type of work before.
DA: I can understand that, someone just wants a pretty picture for their wall. They don't want someone holding a fart!
NG: *laughs* I get so many messages from people on Instagram, being like, do you have any of your work from 2017/2018 left? I find it really hard not to get annoyed with them. To me that stuff is quite vacant and vapid, wet blanket-y.
DA: It's what people like though.
NG: Of course, and I get it like that's a lot less aggressive to put on your wall than someone spitting in someone's mouth.
DA: I want someone spitting in someone's mouth, please!
Currently Untitled, part of a series of A5 drawings for 'In Heat' with Plum Cloutman at Blue Shop Cottage 5th-12th May
Photo courtesy of Nettle Grellier
NG: When I graduated in 2015, I was mainly doing still lives. And I was obsessed with Mary Fedden. I remember one of my tutors telling me that he had a name for commercial work and then another name that he practiced under for the weirder stuff. I guess that's exactly what I did for a while, I just made what I knew I could make a living off. Now I feel like I’m finally doing the thing that really comes from me.
DA: That's great you’ve got to that point. That's an interesting way he looked at it. It sounds quite stressful! I'm just thinking more about your use of the grotesque. I’ve got a great quote from an Artnet article about contemporary female artists - ‘The grotesque becomes a means to dissolve power structures’.
NG: Yeah, that is actually really similar to what my amazing tutor, Benjamin Senior, said to me on the Turps Banana Correspondence Course that I did from 2019 to 2020. That's when I became more interested in the grotesque. I think it dissolves power structures because it's very anti the ideal body image, especially a female body being painted by a male artist. It rejects that in such a way that’s quite extremely the opposite. It's grotesque, it’s disgusting, and it's funny. There are orifices and there are things coming out of them! It’s a great way to reject that. Also then politically it aligns with left liberal ideals and ideologies. I think, quite often, the grotesque comes out of big events. It resurges when big things are happening. It’s maybe slightly more political than other types of figurative painting, but maybe that's a bit of a sweeping statement!
DA: I don't know, I would agree with that. I think it's a really playful way that you can subvert societal structures and societal norms. To poke at things in a way that turns them on their head and opens up a lot more possibilities.
NG: Yeah. Dark humour is very cool human ability and it comes out at times of adversity. I think it is one of the things that we have that we should make use of. It's a strong thing to have a dark sense of humour when things are all going to shit. One of my favourite artists is Lindsey Mendick. I feel like she's nailed that.
DA: Her work is so uniquely her and she's confessional in a very humorous way.
NG: I really like her Instagram! I’m interested in popular culture and people on Instagram and fucking love Island or whatever. I'm not above it just because I'm an ‘artist’. That’s the shit that I like, that makes me think about humans and human nature and stuff much more than reading a shitload of books or something. *laughs*
‘Tangle Tease//Ah ha ha ha Come the Fuckdown’ 2020, Oil on Canvas
120cm x 170cm
Photo courtesy of Nettle Grellier
DA: No, for sure. That's one thing that I remember from Camberwell, a tutor saying to not put your influences into a hierarchy. You could be just as influenced by Big Brother as by reading a monograph of an artist. That was mind-blowing for me!
NG: Yeah, it's really cool when artists accept that within their work and just face it. Lindsey Mendick does that so well. To be an artist that thinks you're intellectually above everyone else is boring.
DA: So true! What would you like people to get from your work?
NG: I want people to take whatever they need, depending on what mood they're in. You might look at a painting of some people shoving their fingers in each other's mouths and slugs crawling over them and you could feel all sorts of things from that depending on your mood, or the kind of person you are. The only thing that pisses me off is when people sexualise them. That's only ever men who assume it's about sex.
DA: It's so difficult, isn't it? If you use a female body in any way it gets instantly sexualised.
NG: Yeah, especially when they are two interacting. Then of course there is an element of the sexual in the grotesque, but more the ugly and bodily function sides of sex rather than like sexualising the body. When I'm making the pictures mostly I'm just laughing at what that people are doing to each other. It depends the mood I'm in when I paint them as well.
DA: No, that makes sense. And so you've mentioned Lindsey Mendick already, but are there any other people whose work really inspires you?
NG: Yeah, there are. I've actually written a list down because I always forget people's names. I was just riffing a list this morning and a few people that came into my brain were Julia Trybala, Rosie Gibbens - a performance artist. She's fucking funny. Zoe Spowage, Plum Cloutman, and Jonathan Lydon Chase as well.
Currently Untitled, part of a series of A5 drawings for 'In Heat' with Plum Cloutman at Blue Shop Cottage 5th-12th May
Photo courtesy of Nettle Grellier
DA: What is it about their work that you specifically connect to? Is that their use of figuration? Is it their use of the grotesque? Is it something else?
NG: They are all quite grotesque artists, and they're all figurative, and they all have a sense of humour that you can see in their work. Also, they're all women apart from Jonathan, who's non-binary. I’m seeking out so much of that kind of visual information at the moment. I just want to see that perspective.
DA: I’ve definitely noticed in my research that there are no men!
NG: It's good though because when we were studying all the books had one woman in them and, of course, now we're trying to make up for everything. I just want to eat up the female perspective for a bit.
DA: Yeah, it’s not intentional. I sometimes worry that it's creating a bubble.
NG: No, I think it's fine. *laughs
DA: *laughs* Nettle says it's fine so I'm going to carry on going! *laughs* Do you find that you're at a stage where you're getting lots of requests to be part of things? Or are you still applying to things?
NG: It comes and gos. I'm applying to lots of stuff and also conversations might happen, and then nothing comes out of them. Sometimes stuff comes up but then there's the big lows, where you're like, nobody wants to work with me. My work shift and blah, blah, blah. I don't think that ever goes away. Does that go when people become really successful?
‘So so (I can’t find it)’ 2020, Oil on canvas
170cm x 120cm
Photo courtesy of Nettle Grellier
DA: Probably not. But it is funny, isn't it? From the outside I'm like, wow, Nettle is doing so well. She's getting all these big shows with big names. But then when it's you, you don't think of it like that do you?
NG: You don't but then you have to be a bit careful as well. Not to be too woe is me about it. Because it's true. I am getting things and there are lots of artists who are finding it a lot harder to get themselves out there. I'm lucky. I've got enough stuff coming in.
DA: You've been talking a bit about your drawing project, but is there anything else that you've been working on? Or exhibitions that are coming up?
NG: Yeah, I've got this old printing tabletop printing press that my dad found in a skip. I'm fixing that up and I'm going to get a little trailer so I can take it to workshop spaces and groups. It would be an accessible printing press for anyone who needs to use it. Then show wise, Plum Cloutman and I have a show coming up at Blue Shop Cottage in the spring. The whole show is about having a sense of humour in a dark time and everything is gonna be tiny. I don't know if we're gonna have time to be able to do this but we wanted to make a smelly candle or soap, because we’re called Plum and Nettle we sound like a Cath Kidston print or something! We wanted it to smell like manure. Then another show is Safe As Milk at Arusha Gallery in Edinburgh, curated by Anna Choutova who's another fucking good artist. It opens in March and it's all about eating and wellness and all the dark side of that, especially during the pandemic.
DA: Lots of exciting things happening then. I look forward to seeing your exhibitions! Thank you so much Nettle.
NG: Thanks so much. I really enjoyed that.
DA: It's been so lovely meeting you. Hopefully it won't be too long until we can see each other in real life!
