The Arts & Culture Journal

Eye-wateringly colourful, masterful draftsmanship and a confident execution make these enigmatic works, by Paul Muzni, intensely powerful. Paul talks us through these pieces and offers some useful advice for students about to enter the daunting prospect of life-after-uni.

Hi Paul, firstly, can you tell us a little about yourself?         

I was born Edinburgh in 1973 and obtained a BA Hons at Grays School of Art in Aberdeen prior to specialising in the life room at the Slade UCL, for my MFA. In 1998, I returned to Grays where I taught life drawing then came back to Edinburgh where I have been continuing to work and paint.  

Who/what influences your style and approach? 

I adopted a transient, ever-evolving, style of painting having been influenced from my time at the Slade under the tutelage of Norman Norris and Euan Uglow. My paintings, although figurative in subject, are painted with abstract concerns in mind. They acknowledge the painted surface and rely on the colours and marks in a plastic way.

Artists such as De Kooning, Auerbach, Bacon and Gerhard Richter have all been influential factors in my work.  They all exhibit a capturing of instances or essences of a moment that are felt in a wholly sensory way as the paint itself commands the viewer with its plasticity.

What draws you to centre your work on the female nude?

The majority of the paintings are of the female nude, this is partly due to the fact that I found that painting a female nude would not have any connotations metaphorically or literally with myself. In the past, work with male nudes were read as portraits of myself. I like to keep the work as subjective as