Express yourself with palette or trowel

KANE Cunningham doesn't do things by halves. Five years ago his Christmas credit card statement came in at a whopping £3,000. But Kane hadn't been on a present buying spree, instead he'd picked up what looked like the bargain of the century; a two bed bungalow with spectacular sea views.

Unfortunately there was one slight problem; the house stood on a cliff and due to coastal erosion was just weeks away from sliding into the sea.

For Kane, an artist known for work with political undertones, this was ideal; it represented the ultimate property crash and he says paying with plastic was symbolic of the credit crunch era.

Kane Cunningham protests outside his cliff top house

"I knew the artwork and project had got big when I was doing a live BBC World Service interview, "says Kane. "This was a project and artwork that touched upon many ideas and many forms of communication in the digital 24 hour world we live in."

The bungalow also took on a character of its own. Kane used it as a studio, set up cameras to film its demise, commissioned music and poetry to celebrate it and held a last supper there with some of the great and good.

He also invited children to write letters to the building in a project known as the Last Post.

"They were writing to the house," he says. "A number were heart wrenching and one said sorry for being responsible about mum and dad splitting up. They were getting things off their chest to an inanimate object that wouldn't judge.

"I still get letters from all over the world even now. Some simply say The House, Scarborough, even bits of paper with just The House."

John Oxley, City of York archaeologist, says he found the whole thing fascinating to have a space that acquired thick layers of paint and dirt over a short period of time and was then demolished.

John Oxley

"In archaeology we have the term taphonomy which is about how a site forms," says John. "We excavate things that are a result of taphonomic processes and normally have to construct in our mind what happened in that space. With the house we had all the records of those layers."

The pair immediately hit it off and were soon out and about on painting expeditions together. John recalls one to Rosedale where the intention was to paint an industrial landscape. But, it seems, Kane was intent on capturing a part of Spain he'd just come back from.

"His response to this place was these bright Spanish colours," says John. "It was extraordinary, how we went from one thing to another. As an archaeologist, the idea of going into a situation with one set of ideas, rapidly re-evaluating what you are dealing with and changing your response is something I am very familiar with.

"It showed the way a creative mind works. You're never quite sure what you will come out with in the end."

Out of this mutual curiosity, the pair have decided to use their different but complementary expertise in a new venture called Palette and Trowel. These painting and archaeology weekends in Ravenscar and York begin in September and are designed to offer an alternative to painting courses that Kane says teach little about the physicality of painting and the adventures that can be had in watercolour.

"For me it's not about responding to a landscape but understanding it," he says. "That's why me and John get on. We ask what's going on here, what can we unpick, what's the political and social narrative?"

With Palette and Trowel the two men adopt the same approach to their disciplines. Both require an inquisitive eye and it's all about getting people to look critically at what's in front of them. Take a field, for example, what do all those humps and hollows really mean and relate to?

John says it's contact with a person in the past that drives people to excavate; to have a personal experience of discovery.

"It can be incredibly intense," he says. "We are interested in what we have done to transform the landscape, building all these structures to live in, to pray in, to defend ourselves in.

"But you don't have to excavate to get that experience. Walking through landscapes and asking how they were formed, deconstructing the different elements, interactions and interventions that have brought it to where it is now can be just as emotional and exciting."

For John the archaeological aspect to this venture doesn't just involve looking at Roman or medieval buildings. He cites the brutalist extension at King's Manor in York as being vitally important.

"You have a beautiful medieval building and in the inner courtyard, this brick and concrete structure," he says. "It completely polarises opinion and takes no prisoners, but for me sits in an authentic way. After all, Georgian builders had no qualms of applying the latest techniques and applying them big time."

Palette and Trowel is not just about teaching, though. John and Kane says this is a catalyst for conversations and dialogues.

"It's an opportunity for us to learn from each other how to open our eyes and minds. How to peel back the layers," says Kane. "When John talks about the landscape from an archaeological perspective, it gives you a better understanding of that space. That informs how you feel and influences how you paint."

Which is all well and good, but the really interesting thing about spending time with John and Kane how they see the same thing differently.

Kane Cunningham

At Lendal Bridge, John waxes lyrically about the crenellations.

"I see a story in this, but not the story the architect saw," he says. "He might have seen it as a construction project, but to me it's a response to the bridge next to it. Taking mediaeval metaphors to speak to the wall behind and it's having a very interesting conversation."

Kane's appreciation is less poetic, more mundane. For him the bridge is a fairly uninspiring thing, but what are those people under it doing, why are they there, whey are they in York right here, right now?

"I'm looking at how it is being used," he says. "The activities interest me, the kind of activities that take place on a Friday night under the bridge, when people are drunk. There's a sort of Hogarthian feel to it."

This double act sounds like it would make an ideal TV programme – any producers out there? But behind the humour lies a serious approach. Palette and Trowel may be an expression of friendship and how two men work together, but it's also a brilliant way of learning how to interpret the world in water colours, by appreciating at first hand how it was shaped.

"You can look at a painting and say that's a beautiful rendition, but from a copyists perspective," says Kane. "We're trying to get people to express something of how they feel about their experience. That gives an honesty you wouldn't get from copying a photo."

Palette and Trowel Moor and Sea will take place on September 18-20 at Raven Hall Hotel, Ravenscar, with York and the Vale of York on October 9-11 at Aldwark Manor.

The cost is £285 per person, but The Press can exclusively offer places at £225. Simply contact John and Kane directly by email saying you have read this feature in the Press at info@paletteandtrowel.co.uk.