The artist is traditionally seen as an individual type, working in solitude, reluctant to collaborate. But what happens when an artist meets another artist. Is there a clash of egos or a respectful mutual admiration of each other’s work and life? Images of Joseph Beuys and Andy Warhol chatting together, or Beuys in Richard Hamilton’s design-conscience home, seem to capture a mutual celebration of creativity, position and power.
Meetings which happen away from the exhibition or show, off stage, out of the limelight and in the everyday, seem significant. It’s not about the artists showing together in the exhibition or sharing the same bill at a concert, which is particularly interesting, it is the meetings which are impromptu and private (although it can help to have someone present to document it). These meetings must have some sort of effect on each artist. It’s stimulating to think of this coming together of artists. How much do they influence each other with their ideas, skills and techniques or is it just through the mutual sharing of their own personal experiences and journey?
John Stansfield’s book, The People’s Sculptor: The Life and Art of William Lamb mentions the crossing of artistic paths between William Lamb and Adam Christie. Lamb was living and working in his home town of Montrose, and it was there that he had met Adam Christie, who himself was an artist living at Sunnyside also in Montrose. In his book, The Gentle Shetlander, Kenneth Keddie also identifies a relationship between the two. Lamb was intrigued by the individuality of Christie’s art, and had offered him tools to help him carve the stones, but Christie refused, preferring the six-inch nail and glass that he had been using. Lamb modelled Christie into his, The Daily News sculpture in 1935. The sculpture is of a heavily coated figure, grappling with newspapers, and it has the face of Christie. Lamb would have been aged 42 and Christie, aged 67.
Lamb also met and related with other artists and writers in Montrose, including Edward Baird, Violet Jacob and Hugh MacDiarmid, during the 1920’s. But, Lamb was visibly much more technically skilled than Christie, so there could have been some influence in the creativity and interpretation of the subject from Christie to Lamb’s art when they met.
Iain Irving 