This is the first part of a new series where Field Grey explores the personal style of our peers. We want to look at the personal ‘uniform’ of our friends, colleagues, clients and peers to examine what fashion means to them and, more broadly, the effects of what they wear in their day-to-day lives, whether that be at work or at home.
In the first of this series, we went to meet the artist John Walter. John, based in Elephant and Castle, specialises in painting, sculpture and installation. He’s renowned for his vibrant and colourful work which translates directly to his clothes, making him the perfect first subject for this series.
At the end of the month, John launches Alien Sex Club, an extensive installation in the cavernous P3 exhibition space at the University of Westminster. The exhibition explores the relationship between contemporary visual culture and HIV. Taking the form of a maze based on the cruising clubs in gay culture, the show will feature a number of exhibits that explore HIV and sexual health, from a Tarot reader to rapid HIV testing.
We popped down to John’s studio while he was working on the many facets of the exhibition to talk to him about his own personal ‘uniform’.
Hi John! What are you wearing today?
JW: I’m wearing a t-shirt from Abandon Ship with a maze-like pattern all over it in turquoise and vermillion – the colours zing against each other and the pattern is quite tight. I’m wearing an Alien Sex Club badge on it. I’m also wearing a pair of shorts from Farah that look like a sort of miniature marbled pattern in white, black and a deeper turquoise. The top and the shorts don’t match. This is important – I’m interested in things that don’t match and how to shove them together. This extends to my green horizontal striped socks and orange Adidas trainers. I am also wearing a Swatch watch that is read, yellow and two blues – all block colours.
What’s your earliest fashion memory?
JW:My mum reports that I took to wearing a green tulle hat when we would go shopping; maybe I was 3 or 4 and she humoured it despite finding it embarrassing. I was a very gay child. I remember buying a pink cardigan and turquoise shorts from one of those magazines people would buy clothes from before the Internet. I was obsessed with a dress that my primary school teacher, Mrs Beddoes, would wear that was like a harlequin, in velvet: mad and really camp in hindsight.
You’re pretty notorious for wearing bright clothes. Do you feel like its become a uniform? Do you ever wear black?
JW:I never wear black! Yuk! Black on black is the laziest most boring thing to me. I wouldn’t wear a uniform, even though artists have made uniforms for themselves. I find wearing the same thing boring. I am not part of a group or a club. A shift over time has been to wear more pattern rather than flat colour. This is also something that has been going on in my work. I suppose I am dressing in a ‘maximalist’ way, because I am thinking in that way too and it is all part of the same thing. If I wore the same thing all the time I would think and make the same thing, that’s not good for the brain or the world.
What’s your favourite item of clothing?
JW:At the moment my favourite piece is a t-shirt from Abandon Ship with watermelon slices all over it. The dyes are so bright it looks like it should be synthetic but somehow its cotton! It goes in cycles, though. My lazy oaf burger jumper was a favourite for a long time.
Now you’re wearing a Tarot costume. Tell us about it and how it fits in to the exhibition?
JW:I often make costumes to perform in. They are a kind of drag but the drag is not that of gender performance but rather a jester one; by dressing the fool, disguising myself or the person performing, it allows the viewer – in this case the person having their tarot read – to drop their guard, particularly if they are a regular art gallery goer. It places them within the context of the carnival. Using clothes to disguise oneself is central to my life and work: I am interested in drawing attention to how we all perform ‘self’ using a variety of tools including vocal intonation, gesture and clothes.
What are you wearing for the launch?
JW:For the opening of Alien Sex Club I wanted to get something special, particularly since I’m not performing for a change. I had a pair of trainers made using the Adidas app that feature one of my own patterns covered in images from Knossos as well as viruses. While we were in Mykonos on holiday I found a t-shirt in a funny boutique that’s covered in ugly cartoon characters – I had to have it! It’s right into the dissonant end of the spectrum! To negotiate between that and the shoes I’ve bought a pair of lemon yellow shorts from Benetton; a solid colour to serve as a join between two different patterns. There is yellow throughout. I love yellow, I always have.
How has your style changed? What do you hope to convey with what you wear?
JW:The way I dress is constantly shifting to respond to my mood, the world outside me and how I wish to engage in it and what is going on in my internal life and work. Dressing is a kind of social armour – for me it’s a way of disarming people – because of the job I do and my social position I can play with people’s perceptions of me with what I wear. I am hyper aware of this but I think we are all doing it. MY way of dressing has changed in the past 5 years from dressing smarter (brogues and Liberty print shirts) to more casual (Lazy Oaf etc.). Partly this has to do with the way my body has changed. I was very thin for a few years and I wore different clothes and wore clothes differently because of that. Now I’m a bit fatter again I’ve had to respond to that by wearing different clothes to feel comfortable with how I present myself to the world. Clothing is armour after all!
For more information on Alien Sex Club, visit the website.