What Lies Beneath:

Tom Ferson

Inteviewed by Ben Frost

Ben Frost:  I first came across your work when you moved into Stupidkrap Studios and I was pretty blown away initially by the technique that you use. Tell me about how you make those artworks.

Tom Ferson: They're actually engravings.  That would be the best way of describing them.  I make them on thick plywood, applying layers of bright house paint and engraving into it to reveal the layers.

B: So you've got one here that you're just starting?

T: Yep

B: Take me through the process.

T: Well you can kind of see the wood grain and everything through it too - which I like. I firstly covered the whole thing in blue - this one's only going to have one or two tones I guess.  Then I mask out the shape that I want to use and cover that in black. Then I attack it with an engraver and scratch off the black to reveal the blue, or scratch through both the colours to reveal the wood grain.  I get a variation of tones from doing that.

B: How many layers of paint could you possibly use to get the observation of each colour through that depth? Could you for example use 5 colours?

T: Each work to me has kind of been experimental in the technique.  I've been doing these engravings for about 2 years, so i'm always stumbling across new ways of doing things,  mostly via a series of accidents.  So i've been working on using a number of different layers to see what it looks like, and to see if you can see each colour coming through.

B: So what type of engraving tool are you using?

T: I have a Dremel electric engraver that was suggested to me a while ago. Ever since i've been buying new engraving heads from Mitre10 pretty much every week.

B: What kind of work were you doing prior to this engraving style?

T: I have been interested in streetscapes and landscapes for quite awhile and got stuck into oil painting which I did at COFA (Sydney College of Fine Arts), and this felt really good to me. I just started to wrap my head around using colour and exploring tone,
but there were too many options for me using oil paints - I think I have to restrict myself to be more creative. Using fewer colours really works for me now. I made a lot of oil-painting street scapes and I think i'll eventually end up coming back to that kind of thing maybe.

B: I’m very interested in the idea of using a machine. I know in my work, I use the computer a lot and also an overhead projector and my mantra has always been to use machines to create my work.  Even a spray-can is kind of like a machine tool in the way you press a button and paint comes out, and stencils also have this automated feel - mechanically generated.  Also this idea that artwork is pre-designed before it hits the actual canvas - which I can see a lot in your work   What’s your take on that kind of use of a machine to make artwork?

T: Its pretty integral to my practice right now. I have to have access to electricity to use the engraver and I also work directly from a laptop with the images in Photoshop.  With the laptop, I can get right up close to a specific section of a face for example, which is really
important to me.

B: So in a way the process is really one of accurately copying the image from the laptop to the canvas?

T: Yeah

B: I think that’s an interesting element in certain types of art. I went to an artist talk at NAS (National Art School) the other night and was listening to these people talk about pushing paint around on a canvas - which I've never really understood.
For many traditional painters, the journey of the process is very important, so the end result can be very different from what they initially intended. In my own work, i'm very much into this idea of copying - or designing something and then translating it onto a canvas.
You came from a COFA background - is this kind of concept driven element heavy at COFA? 

T: COFA is very concept driven. But I kind of used my time there as just a space, and a way to learn about different processes and materials. I find working with a conceptual basis can often be more successful, but I’m never really attracted to a work unless it’s got an immediate visual impact. So with my work I generally know how it’s going to end up looking, but though the process I try and involve myself and explore the little bits of information about me.
I'm reflecting the individual things about me, the situation where I exist in the world and all the individual things i'm interested in, which is to me, the only conceptual depth with my work. It describes my time and my place and me.

B:  Where are you sourcing your imagery? A lot of them have a vintage or retro feel

T: I think that is part of where I am as well. I live in Erskineville which has a lot of book shops and most of them are filled with 70’s Playboy magazines, which I think sums up this country perfectly. They're a lot of fun. I enjoy the initial impact of the images and like translating them in a new way that reflects a different time - which is kind of interesting in itself. That these images can span decades and in new techniques.

B: Yeah - when you see a 70’s Playboy image in our current time and context they seem surreal and ridiculous. Sourcing images from the 60's and 70's is often way more interesting because of how bizarre and ironic they are.
Tell me more about this piece - it looks like a picture of a body bag with blood and people standing around. When I saw it on your blog I actually thought it was a photograph - I think when you shrink it down on a computer screen its harder to see that it's actually an engraving.

T: I spent some time in Mexico with friends of mine and I found the newspapers there to be very foreign and alien to me as 70’s Playboys are. Their depiction of death is really upfront and brutal basically. I tried to translate them just as I would any other image, using lots of pastel colours and texture, that makes the image look more successful. You know what its really depicting, so even though there's a lot of blood and gore in this photo its not the first thing you see if you are up close to it.

B: It’s interesting,  I find that in my work and a lot of masculine work, the two reccurring themes are usually sex and death. So having touched on your death piece, lets have a talk about some of your more sexy pieces.

T: (laughs) Sexy, ok. This is kind of an older piece. It's from around late 2009, and is part of the first body of work i've completed in this certain style.

B: I thought it was interesting that in a lot of your sexy works, the idea of looking at a half-dressed woman is about a sense of revealing and taking away layers. That's kind of the process in your work - taking away layers and that’s also reflected in your subject matter.

T: I find that very interesting. The process of engraving for me has always been something that I really enjoy applying to skin. The amount of detail, time and effort that I have to spend on translating the way skin looks, by using the lines and engraving into a surface -
there's something really intimate about that process which I enjoy. There’s also a natural organic fluctuation in the linework as the result of that much repetition. The lines suits skin better because it often looks more convincing - and especially because of the faults.

B: It must be frustrating because, because your'e using a subtractive process - whereas painting is all about adding and adding and adding. You're taking away from the canvas and when you take something away you cant really put it back.  I’m amazed by some of the newer work just how flawless they are, there are little errors here and there, but just the movement and direction of the things that are happening are incredible.  Tell me more about what the nails pieces are exploring, because I notice your'e using nails a lot in this other thread to your work.

T: Nails for me, are really just another way of replicating the technique of engraving. It's just spot colour on top of black and repetition. It's something I really enjoy for some reason. When I'm getting stuck into the actual act of having to repeat something for so long, it becomes meditative. It takes a lot of time sitting there, punching all those nails in by hand.  I guess bringing in what you said before, about the interaction between machines and my hand, is that I am sitting here nailing these in by hand, each one. Although it’s a very mechanical kind of process with metal, you can still see the organic fluctuations that results from me doing it over and over again with my hands. So that’s really what the nails are: repetition and organic fluctuation - even in that mechanical process.

B: I notice the titles you have for these use words like psychotropic or psychedelic...

T: Its kind of having an effect on your mind really. To me it’s about trying to get people to react with the surface. Specifically with this artwork it’s really pretty important to the success of it, to try and get up and engage with it. As for the other ones which were trying to capture movement or some sense of playing with your mind, it's really kind of your reactions to the artworks.

B: And depth I think.

T: Yup.

B: Ok this is physically about depth, but at the same time your trying to create sort of a half-tone effect like you would see in newspaper photographs.  The illusion of depth physically also visually. It’s really interesting.  So what’s the title of your exhibition?

T: Bravery, Repetition and Noise

B: Well I guess that probably sums up exactly what we're talking about.

T: Yeah, well hopefully. It’s a title of an album by the Brian Jonestown Massacre. Wasn’t sure if I wanted to use it initially, but it made so much sense to me.

B: You were just talking earlier about your band. Is music important to you in your creative process?

T: Yeah definitely. Particularly the abstract kind of works. I listen to music non-stop.  I don’t ever work without music around and sometimes I tend to get different vibes from different bands which I really enjoy.  It’s something that I’ve always been involved with, so its always going to come out in my work whether I try to or not.

B: What band are you in?

T: I’m in a band called Sooners

B: Awesome. Whereabouts do you play?           

T: I play all about the place. I’m actually playing on the 30^th of March -  two days after my exhibition.

B: Whereabouts?

T: Good God Small Club. I’ve ended up using my artworks as the cover of our 7” we just released, which is pretty much a dream for me having those two combined.

B: Awesome! Thanks for your time.