Nick Botting
Botting was born in 1963. He obtained a BA Honours in Visual and Performed Art from the University Of Kent in 1986One Summer in Cape Town
“En Plein Air” is a rather innocuous French term meaning “in the open air” which primarily describes the act of painting outdoors , championed by the Impressionists as being the only way to record nature and the environment. The term belies the technical rigour and physical determination required to go out into the elements day after day and record the world.
Nick Botting only paints en plain air and has tramped much around the world, including urban and rural Britain, Pakistan and the Australian outback, where he painted a life- size portrait of himself (having carried a full length mirror out into the desert) which went on to be highly commended in the BP Portrait Award competition at the National Gallery in London. This self-portrait perhaps most aptly describes the man, as he staked it on the desert floor to dry, only to find that when he returned, a fine layer of sand had blown over it and adhered to the surface, not obscuring the image unless you stood at a particular angle when, like a hologram, it suddenly flashed a crimson, desert red as the grains of sand reflected light. Minute insect footprints in the oil completed the picture. Botting found this deeply amusing and strangely pertinent as did the adjudicators of the Award.
This summer Botting braved the sun, the South Easter, and the curious bystanders of Cape Town as he set out with box easel and canvas to record our city and surrounds.
When looking at this collection of work one is mindful of those other Englishmen that visited our shores (and stayed) over 150 years ago. Men such as Thomas Baines and Thomas Bowler who , in the mid 1800’s, were similarly bewitched by the Cape (and other parts of southern Africa) and who left detailed pictorial records of their time here which continue to haunt and enthrall us. There is something magical about recognizing familiar topography and climactic innuendos as recorded by another hand. In Baines’ and Bowler’s case one looks through the veil of time, noticing what has changed and indeed what has not. Marveling at the Tallships in the harbour that will surely never return. Trying to imagine a beach in Woodstock; a Strand Street on the strand.
In Botting’s case we notice the verity of his paintings now, almost as if we are the defenders of the integrity of the works that future generations will look at in the same way as we do Baines’ and Bowler.
In both instances however we are experiencing the world through the eyes of a faithful “scribe”, and for me, the sense of the man, standing on the hilltop making marks to represent the world around him, somehow also records the man – and through the man we can feel the wind whipping around our ears ; hear the waves crashing ; or just bake in the still evening light.
We also commune with the inhabitants of these landscapes . Curiously, though Botting describes contemporary life, and the protagonists could just as readily be ourselves (or neighbours) as nameless strangers, he evokes a wistfulness, as if we were looking back through time. His timeless, frozen moments capture us, without prejudice, offering up our presence - our demeanour - without psychology or politics. Consequently we are free to engage both as the voyeur and as the protagonists. We can see and recognize the stranger described, and we can inhabit the protagonists and see ourselves, or perhaps even feel what it is for others to see us. Perhaps in a hundred and fifty years others will see us and wonder what it was like to be us...
They will also wonder who was this man, Nick Botting. Maybe they will stumble on his self-portrait in the desert…
Some Quotes from the Critics:
"It is incredible how he has summed up the tense moment of taking the wicket - you can sense it in the crowd and the batsman. And of course the stadium he has painted is my local in Lahore."
Imran Khan - May 2001
"Botting is already a considerable painter and is on his way to being an important one."
Godfrey Barker (May 2001) Writes on art for The Times, Die Welt and The Wall Street Journal.
“Nick Botting was the man who pinned down Ian Botham for long enough to paint a portrait. This is no mean feat in itself, and to turn out the sort of study of the great all-rounder that Botting has managed is worthy of still greater credit. Or, rather, studies, since the sitting with Botham, cigar poised in right hand, in Lahore last November has yielded three separate paintings. All - they are three different sizes - are on show at Lord´s until July. They are the first proper portraits of Botham, but anybody hoping to purchase one for their private collection will be disappointed. The MCC have acquired one, the cricketer turned equally feisty commentator has snaffled one for himself and Botting is keeping one.
There are more than 30 other pictures in the exhibition, all painted on Botting´s trip to Pakistan last winter as the MCC´s official artist. They are sturdy pictures of cricket and cricketers, capturing effort and muscle tone, but they depict Pakistan accurately in its vibrant singularity. Botting is prolific and has another exhibition on at the Catto Gallery in Heath Street, London until 8 June. That contains only two cricket pictures but the description of the art critic Godfrey Barker must suffice for Outfield: "I´m hard put to think of another living artist who hits off the moods and emotions of crowds with such assurance."
Stephen Brenkley - 27 May 2001 - The Independent
"The challenge for England´s batsmen at Lord´s on Friday was small compared with that for artist Nick Botting, who was shown on television, seated beyond the boundary, evidently painting the scene. In fact he was preparing the groundwork for what could be the most important work of his career - the presentation of the teams to the Queen. The MCC have been commissioning artists, including Botting, to follow England tours, and the artist´s challenge was great. The event would be brief, and one could hardly ask her majesty to hold a pose or ´do it again´. At least the background - the famous old pavilion - could be sketched in advance. Then rain intervened. Uncertainty raged as to whether they would go indoors or stay outside. Botting gambled on the latter - and was then late joining the throng in the committee room. Scurrying around among the many members trying to get a look, Botting snapped away with his camera. It will, he says, be a different painting from that which he first envisaged - not least because there will be no pavilion. ´But I honestly don´t know what will happen. I´ll just have to look at the photos, and Channel 4´s pictures, and see what happens."
Norman Harris - Sunday July 22, 2001 - The Observer
