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TEBI podcast 51: Helen Arthur on art as a new rural lifestyle
344 Plays8 months ago
In the 11th of a series of 12 TEBI episodes looking at meaning and money during later careers or second lives, Jonathan Hollow talks to a self-trained artist who has made a mid-life new life for herself on the Welsh borders.
Many people dream of painting for a living, but Helen Arthur has made it happen. She describes her success as modest financially, but she is highly focused on her own artistic goals, and on those terms she has achieved contentment alongside success. She is fascinatingly articulate about how she pursues those goals, and how she's moved from a place of safety to artistic experimentation, always seeking new ways to capture the glories of the Welsh landscape that looms outside her house.
This podcast series has been developed with financial planning firm Mulberry Bow. Based in London, they offer a highly personalised service to around 150 individuals and families. Robin Powell and Jonathan Hollow are very grateful for their enthusiastic support for "Second Lives”.
Transcript: https://www.evidenceinvestor.com/second-lives-civil-servant-artist/ --
Helen’s website: https://www.helenarthur.art/ —
Helen’s “Kitchen Table Creatives” newsletter: https://kitchentablecreatives.substack.com/ --
Mulberry Bow financial planners: https://mulberrybow.com/ —
Jonathan Hollow and Robin Powell's book "How To Fund The Life You Want": http://tinyurl.com/how2fund --
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Second Lives' Podcast
00:00:03
Speaker
I'm Jonathan Hollow and welcome back to Second Lives, a series of 12 podcasts for the evidence-based investor looking into how lives can take a new direction.
Funding the Life You Want with Robin Powell
00:00:13
Speaker
In the book that Robin Powell and I published last year, How to Fund the Life You Want, we said, What's the point of sorting out your money only to fund the wrong life?
00:00:24
Speaker
Today's interview is a great example of someone funding the right Second Life. When
Discovering Helen Arthur's Artistic Talent
00:00:30
Speaker
I was preparing for this series and saw that my old colleague Helen Arthur had turned her hands from editorial work to art, I clicked on the link to her website with a mild curiosity.
00:00:42
Speaker
Nothing prepared me for the sheer artistic talent that she displays there. I visit many artists' open houses, here where I live in Kent. Many of these self-taught artists create pleasing work, but almost none has hit the artistic jackpot.
00:00:59
Speaker
yet Helen, who is also self-taught, most definitely has. I would encourage you to follow the links I have put in the podcast notes to see examples of some of her wonderful prints and paintings. Helen hasn't hit the financial jackpot, as you will hear later, but she has created a comfortable second life of great beauty and integrity while nurturing her unquenchable artistic restlessness.
00:01:25
Speaker
And as you will hear, she is strikingly articulate about her artistic aims and methods and how she fits her artistic business into her Welsh borders setting and its local community. Just
Sponsorship by Mulberry Bowe
00:01:38
Speaker
before we roll this interview with Helen, I'd like to say a word about Mulberry Bowe.
00:01:43
Speaker
This podcast is brought to you in collaboration with them. They are a very different chartered financial planning boutique in the City of London, one that offers a highly personalized service to around 150 individuals and families. Robin Powell and I like the fact that the team at Mulberry Bowe do not have sales targets nor their own financial products to sell. As they like to say, they sit on your side of the table.
00:02:09
Speaker
For more information, just Google Mulberry Bow Wealth Planning or follow the links in the notes for this podcast. So now, to Helen Arthur.
Brexit as a Catalyst for Change
00:02:20
Speaker
Helen, oddly enough, I want to start not with art, but Brexit. You said the Brexit referendum result was a wake-up call in your life. What did you wake up to?
00:02:31
Speaker
Yes, so I was working with the Environment Agency at the time that the referendum results were announced and I continued in that sector which was a good alignment for my own interests at the time.
00:02:46
Speaker
But the morale was so low and it really made me reflect on what I was doing, you know, what was central to my life. There were actually tears among my colleagues when the results came through because I think they could see what was ahead. And I'm myself from such a strong European. I'm on the National Council of the European Movement.
00:03:11
Speaker
Yeah, I think it was a real wake-up call. I think I just decided that I really wanted my purpose in life to be, well, the thing that I was doing with most of the hours of my life, to be a really positive one. And I had a strong hobby interest in printmaking at the time.
00:03:33
Speaker
begun it a couple of years before and I just thought I really wanted to give that a go, you know, and I wanted to teach because I wanted to share all the benefits that art making had brought to me. So, yeah, I kind of put everything in, put all the eggs in my basket and decided to give up the consultancy work that I was doing
00:03:55
Speaker
So we'll explore a little bit of that move that you made throughout the rest of the interview, but I'm interested in the Brexit result being a trigger. Was it moving away from a negative thing or moving towards a positive thing?
00:04:09
Speaker
It was to continue growth, yes. I felt like Brexit was so regressive. I needed an outlet that was about growth and positivity, yes. I think my time
00:04:25
Speaker
being a productive and effective comms and editor in the environment sector had really come to an end in terms of energy. And I wanted to place my energy somewhere much more sort of forward looking.
Relocating for Family and Environment
00:04:45
Speaker
You also said that having children gave you the courage and confidence to make art and to show art. Can you explain that?
00:04:54
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's a surprising statement. I think for a lot of women, having children can be quite restricting or certainly makes them shift their lives in a slightly more narrowing way, especially in the sort of early years.
00:05:11
Speaker
For me, I think even just the act of having children made me feel quite invincible. It's a very powerful thing in your life and it really shifts energy. But it also made me really appreciate the time that I had had
00:05:31
Speaker
the children made me very time aware and time efficient. But it also gave me a very strong sense of identity being a parent. And I think that sort of triggered this outpouring of expressive and creative manifestations. It's a strange thing, but you really know who you are when you're raising young people. But it also, I realised quite recently,
00:06:01
Speaker
It did trigger a move out of London to quite a rural lifestyle, and I think the two were quite intertwined. My creative response to landscape was because we'd moved from city living, so they're interconnected. I don't think I would have left London if I hadn't had young children.
00:06:23
Speaker
But I think the art is a response to living in a natural environment and a beautiful landscape too. Was it that you felt that London was an undesirable environment to be bringing children up in?
00:06:40
Speaker
I had had a very positive experience of community with young children in London, but myself and my partner were rather concerned about schooling and just the sheer numbers of children in schools and
00:07:02
Speaker
just the lack of resources as well. And I think that was for us the main sort of prohibition. We were finding ourselves driving out to Kent every weekend to get lovely walks and to get the kids into nature.
00:07:19
Speaker
And so when this time for primary school that our oldest going to primary school came, I think we just made the decision and took the plunge. And three months later, we were moving to South Wales.
From Business to Art
00:07:33
Speaker
So it was a bit of a sort of lightning decision. And can you just say a little bit to build up a picture for the listeners about the working life that you created and then left behind in London?
00:07:47
Speaker
Yes, I had had a very strong business. I'd established it in 2005, 2006 perhaps. I'd previously worked with the BBC as an online content producer in their history department and had some really exciting times there. I then moved into working with government departments.
00:08:16
Speaker
and it was a very successful business in lots of ways. So my oldest was born in 2010, so it was well established and it did afford me to have a good time to raise the children when they were very young.
00:08:39
Speaker
And then I also returned to working with the Ministry of Justice with my second being one year old and continue to work with them when we moved away from London. So they allowed flexible working. I certainly have no regrets at all about establishing that business. So let's talk about art and landscape. What are your earliest memories of making art?
00:09:08
Speaker
Yeah, I was having a really good think about this. I think it was almost, well certainly at age three I've got very vivid memories of working with clay and getting lots of lovely gloopy orange paint and making a hedgehog in clay and that was definitely preschool.
00:09:30
Speaker
I moved to Singapore aged four but this was in UK and I was living rorally as a young child then as well and I also remember absolute love for conkers and seed heads and insects and so I often would collect, make big collections of them and arrange them in patterns and
00:09:57
Speaker
Many children are making art without even consciously trying. I did do art as a GCSE and I started A Level Art, but I was more of an academic child because I decided that I was going to try and get into Cambridge. So unfortunately, the art fell by the wayside at that point.
00:10:26
Speaker
And your roots go back to Wales and the Welsh landscape is an important feature of your art. What are your earliest memories of Wales and the Welsh landscape? So spent from 11, certainly to sort of a level sort of 16, 17, I was outside a lot. That was my childhood. I had a fat Welsh pony.
00:10:53
Speaker
So I was out on him and there's a teenage relationship with escape into landscape and the sort of romanticism, the sort of lyricism of landscape. It is spiritual for me. I am not a religious person, but I think the sort of awe that I have for landscape, it's quite hard to put into language really, but
00:11:20
Speaker
It comes out in colour and expression, I think, when I paint.
00:11:27
Speaker
This is Jonathan Hollow and you're listening to Second Lives. I'm interviewing Helen Arthur about her change from policy publisher to nature and landscape artist. In 2014, that was when you left London quite quickly and you moved to Wales. But it was later that you came across the house with the studio where you now work in the Brecon Beacons.
00:11:51
Speaker
And
Studio Restoration in the Brecon Beacons
00:11:51
Speaker
you said that the restoration of that studio was a huge trigger for the art you now do. Can you talk about why it was such a trigger?
00:11:59
Speaker
Yes, well, we saw this beautiful house, but it had a rather, shall we say, clapped out annex on the edge. And it's right by, it's under the ridge that's called Hatterall Ridge, which offers Dyke Path, effectively. So we sit right on the border of Wales and England, which seems somehow quite reflective of my own, my parenting and
00:12:27
Speaker
It just seems perfect really and I stepped into the annex with its crumbly ceilings and beautiful old stone, rugged stone walls and it's a very odd shaped room, really quite unusual and I just kind of knew immediately
00:12:46
Speaker
what I needed to do with it. It had strange little rooms upstairs. Apparently it had been seamstresses at some point and it had even been a separate dwelling to the farmhouse that it's built onto. And yeah, I just knew straight away it needed to become a studio. It's got two stories, but just making that
00:13:10
Speaker
financial commitment made me realise I was taking myself seriously and it was almost as if I was giving myself permission to really grow my creative outlets but also to share them. I really sensed that this could be a place
00:13:32
Speaker
within my local community that people could come and enjoy and I could share my skills and my passion. So I started with the studio but I'm gradually taking over the whole house because I've since converted our second
00:13:50
Speaker
sitting room into a gallery room. So I've got lovely colors in here and it's just full of art and the family don't bother with it now. They've given it over to me. Another transition you've talked about is moving from what you described as the safety and security of process and teaching to your own painting. Why do you describe process as a place of safety?
00:14:20
Speaker
So when I was learning to print make, I was learning, firstly, I learned linocut printmaking and then I took on etching, which is also a very lovely process. But I was so involved in learning how to use the tools and what
00:14:38
Speaker
what the inks could do and what sort of paper to buy. I think I stopped asking myself what is my art really about and what part of me am I sharing and expressing through the imagery. So I was making really fun images, mainly of wildlife, but I think they were a bit cliched and I don't think they really had enough of me in them.
00:15:07
Speaker
And so I realised actually it was partly to do with lockdown as well because I couldn't teach people anymore and my teaching was all about a process then as well. I realised that I had to
00:15:23
Speaker
uncover something a bit deeper and lockdown came and I think a lot of us did that. We suddenly had to ask ourselves what's important in life and for us, we were so lucky to live here and I just realised how important landscape is to me and so I literally started to paint with printmaking inks actually.
00:15:52
Speaker
and I'd be out in the landscape after homeschooling. I'd take the kids out and we'd get our daily exercise but I'd always have something to draw with and then I'd come back and use my inks and my rollers and make paintings and then realize of course I need
00:16:10
Speaker
probably need some paints. But it also was to do with time because time became very elastic in lockdown, didn't it? And I suddenly had these passages of time that I could fill and it wasn't so concerning if hours went and things had not
00:16:32
Speaker
necessarily turned into anything obvious. So I think it was, in a way, it was a blessing because I could really explore and really follow my curiosity.
00:16:47
Speaker
Now for a word from Mulberry Bowe, who have collaborated with us to develop this series. I spoke to Simon Bullock of Mulberry Bowe. Does he ever have to work to build up a client's financial confidence? Here's what he had to say. I mean, a lot of our clients are quite financially sophisticated, but by no means all, you know, we're conscious there are clients who are more than intelligent enough to understand all the key financial concepts, but they simply haven't been exposed to them very much.
00:17:18
Speaker
A classic example is when we help someone who has gone for a big life change. It might be they've sold their business or they're going through a divorce or they've had an improvement. And in such circumstances, moving slowly is important, giving the client more time, additional meetings if needed in that initial phase. I mean, everything from the room
00:17:39
Speaker
We conduct the meeting in, the team members who attend, and the way we communicate is adjusted to help put that client at ease. And then we can begin helping them steadily build their financial confidence. Thank you. That was Simon Bullock, the founder of Mulberry Bow. And now back to Helen Arthur and her new business of art.
00:18:03
Speaker
Can you say a little bit more about this sense you have of bringing more of your own self into the painting and the art making? I'm just curious about the dynamic between that and you're actually wanting to capture a landscape which is to some extent an objective thing that's out there.
00:18:24
Speaker
Oh yeah, that's such a good question and I think understanding the to and fro between a sort of external stimulus and their personal interpretation is quite fundamental to being a really expressive artist. I think primarily
00:18:49
Speaker
that all art is of your hand, so it's therefore very personal. I am not, I do not
00:19:00
Speaker
think at any point that representative art is not also abstract because the very act of making a mark on a piece of paper, on a piece of wood, on a canvas, that in itself is an abstraction. But within that abstraction there is always your hand, your vision,
00:19:24
Speaker
is also an interpretation. We're distracted by objectivity and that takes us away from our sort of personal voice in art. Once you've recognized that, I think you can really open yourself up to interpretation and its interpretation and your self and your emotional response
00:19:49
Speaker
to the external that makes really strong and intriguing art for other people to engage with. And, you know, I do find that people are, you think you've taken an extra risk or a piece of works, particularly sort of zany or unusual, and that's the piece that people will be drawn to and really enjoy talking to you about. If I were to watch you
00:20:18
Speaker
beginning a new artwork, working in the studio or outdoors, what would I actually see? So topographically, I would not say you wouldn't want to be buying my paintings if you want topographical representation of the Brecon Beacons, but they are very much the essence of where I live and my constant taking in of the view.
00:20:43
Speaker
I will tend to work, if I'm working on a canvas, I tend to work right off the edges and onto the floor or whatever. I do often work on the floor or in a field, so materials go everywhere.
00:20:59
Speaker
And then I start building up layers so I work with, in the early layers I work with acrylic paint and I also reduce it a lot so I am known to put my paintings in showers because that brings in this extra element of surprise. The semi-dried areas of paint will remain on the canvas and some will wash away
00:21:26
Speaker
and you get these beautiful sort of watery passages and then more opaque areas of paint and they're unpredictable and that gives you something to respond to which is really much more exciting than if you're trying to control the materials. And then as I come more closure I find that I go back to line again and I often use pastels or oil sticks and I bring in a bit more detail and
00:21:56
Speaker
At that point I usually find the landscape within all the layers of paint, so up until quite late in the painting I don't really necessarily know what area of landscape I'll be painting. So it'll be from memory and from sketching outside, but they do emerge as the painting progresses.
00:22:24
Speaker
You've said that artists are often incredibly good at making money if they want to be. And you've also described yourself as earning not quite a living wage. Tell me about the commercial choices you've made and what financial success looks like for you.
00:22:41
Speaker
I
Balancing Creativity and Commercial Success
00:22:41
Speaker
think I have quite a good business mind and I certainly, you know, I'm quite inspired by... There are some artists I can refer to that run extremely successful businesses, mainly through teaching. And so when I did commit to opening the studio up to the public,
00:23:06
Speaker
I did know that teaching would be probably the strongest income solves, but I didn't want the need for income to influence the type of art that I was making. I think that is another reason that people become slightly sort of narrow-minded in what they're making, and they lose their curiosity for making new art.
00:23:33
Speaker
So I did make some decisions around setting up different income streams to protect creative time and creative sort of exploration. So the teaching is one. I also did realize that inviting people to look around the studio and into the gallery room is another way to engage and build
00:24:01
Speaker
build an audience, but build connections. And then I identified funding and working in the community and more social projects as another source of income. And I think by diversifying and having those running in tandem, you can then balance your books.
00:24:29
Speaker
whilst not sort of forcing yourself to reproduce very specific types of art for people. I set annual goals and then sort of seasonal goals but I have to say I think in any other business I would be much more on it checking in as to whether I
00:24:51
Speaker
I meet those financial sort of targets. My first sort of post-lockdown year, I surpassed my sort of annual income target by quite a significant amount actually, but I did reinvest most of the money back into the business and now have an extremely well-equipped studio. So I'm very lucky to have that.
00:25:23
Speaker
This is Jonathan Hollow and you're listening to Second Lives. I'm talking to Helen Arthur about how she discovered and nurtured a purposeful passion for painting. When you were very young, you said to your mother that you wanted to be a local artist.
00:25:40
Speaker
Yeah. That mean in practice. I have no idea why, aged 11, that was something. So I obviously enjoyed going to open studios and looking at people's work and, you know, I do remember that any gifts I was given by any relatives was always coloured pencils or paints or paper or
00:26:04
Speaker
So I obviously identified really strongly with creative people, but I think from experience now of having quite a strong online presence and selling through Instagram, which happened to a lot of artists because of lockdown and people were sort of nesting because they were forced to be in their four walls such a lot,
00:26:30
Speaker
and then more developing the teaching and face-to-face marketing and open studios, that's really a much stronger relationship. And I quite enjoy this notoriety. I'm the sort of artist in the village. I feel a bit like I'm in the film Chocolat, but I'm the artist rather than the chocolatier.
00:26:59
Speaker
You know, people really are quite proud that the galleries here, it is a very remote village and there's not a lot here apart from a pub and a very good local shop actually, but it's really quite lovely for the village and I get asked to
00:27:17
Speaker
be involved in lots of things. So I've just given some work to Jamie's Farm, which is a charity that helps underprivileged children have rural experiences and training right out in the Herefordshire countryside. So I've just contributed an artwork for their open day and I do go and teach there a bit and
00:27:48
Speaker
It just feels really vital and it feels a bit more meaningful I think. I also find that I have a lot of people come and I have a sort of niche market of honeymooners and they're all in the area or they're married in the area.
00:28:06
Speaker
and they do want to take home something special, so I often do commissions with them. But it just feels quite magical. You're just this little part in a very special occasion, and I think that it's meaningful. And I think what people love is the sense that you're making it
00:28:32
Speaker
attainable for them too, that you've kind of gone for your passion, you've followed your passion and you're making something of it and they could too
00:28:45
Speaker
At the beginning of the interview, you were talking about moving from a very negative thing to something that you find very positive and very constructive, and you've used the word magic several times to describe. I'm interested in what you would now say that you're trying to achieve. What is your goal? It's a wonderful question, but it does feel really hard to
00:29:14
Speaker
to give you a pithy response. But do you know, one part of it is that I wake up every day feeling excited about what the day holds and what's growing.
Health Benefits of Creativity
00:29:28
Speaker
And I think it's that sense of anything is possible and there's new things to explore and learn. So it feels very vital that you're constantly
00:29:43
Speaker
you're sort of keeping agile, not just sort of brain-wise, but I think even health-wise, you know,
00:29:54
Speaker
Well, it is known that creativity affects our health, you know, in a positive way. It sort of lowers blood pressure and all sorts of physiological responses happen in the body when you're in the flow state. So I think it's partly that. I also feel that I'm a really good example to my children that you can
00:30:21
Speaker
trust in your own abilities and you can trust in creativity to reward you. Of course I'd love to get into Tate Britain one day but I don't think that's going to happen. That's okay, there's a little bit of ego always I think when you make things.
00:30:42
Speaker
And do you find that you sometimes have to tell yourself to stop doing it because you've got a limitless appetite for the creativity and the act of creation? Yeah, and there are days when it feels, yeah, I've just got to actually turn the light off and go to sleep. Unfortunately, often there's a lot of the more, you know, I'm always reading about
00:31:08
Speaker
improving my writing around art, for example. So it's less the exciting sort of splashing paint around. And then there are days where you actually do have to just stop because I think you can fall into the trap of forcing
00:31:29
Speaker
forcing yourself to make something when actually you should just be responding and allowing a new energy in, whether that's because the season's changed and the landscape's changing.
00:31:44
Speaker
So you do have to reflect and you do have to just go and watch some crap telly or do something completely different because it can get a little bit sort of intense I think. And I think you don't function so well
00:32:03
Speaker
when you're a bit frenetic. So thankfully, I have the children and my partner and various creatures, dogs and gerbils and, you know, I have commitments and I have to step away from it all because I think you're right, we can let our appetites get away with us, get away from us.
Conclusion and Farewell
00:32:29
Speaker
Well, thank you, Helen, for opening up your life and your world of art to us. It's been a really fascinating interview. Well, I'm extremely grateful for the opportunity. And so it's very interesting to consider these questions because I think we don't often stop to really investigate some of these questions. So I've really enjoyed it and very much appreciate it. Thank you.
00:32:59
Speaker
So that was Helen Arthur. I so enjoy the way she articulates her art. I highly recommend a visit to her gallery room on the Welsh borders, which I found to be a very complete and satisfying artistic experience. And needless to say, I bought a picture. I have also put a link in the podcast notes to her kitchen table creatives. These are remote art lessons that you can sign up for.
00:33:26
Speaker
I think the interview with Helen is a very fitting finish to the interviewee list for this second live series. She is the 11th of 11 interviewees. In the 12th and final episode of the series, I'll be taking a look back at all my interviewees with Simon Bullock of Mulberry Bowe. He'll be picking out his favourite parts of the interviews and linking them to what he has learned about life, planning and satisfaction in his work over the years.