The Arts & Culture Journal

Print-maker Bill Pryde was a late bloomer indeed! Taking Art Foundation at Byam Shaw at nearly 50 years old, Bill’s love for print-making came after a career spanning some 30 years directing theatre, TV and film.

“I had no interest in art, not even an O level, nothing, at school.. (the Play was the Thing) but I suppose I was always interested in the visual aspects of theatre, as well as the dramatic and poetic. So after a few years of working at small paintings, just for fun, I was encouraged by friends and took myself off to art college.”

Falling for screen-printing and linocut immediately, Bill’s influences are widespread and diverse from Patrick Caulfield, Gary Hume, Derrick Greaves, Patrick Heron to American Pop Art: Warhol, Wessellman and Sister Corita.

Bill’s latest series, featured here, focuses on landscapes. Often, contrasting colours are explored with a tentativeness that gels into harmonious and reassuring work. The influence of his palette can be attributed to the work of Barbara Rae although Bill’s rhythmical waves of colour create a far more soothing product.

I asked Bill about any underlying messages - themes that ran through his work:

“I think Matisse was right when he said all artists should have their tongues cut out (or words to that effect) but I have to own up that my work celebrates the Now; aliveness, Seeing and Believing - The power of the image as the image (and the universe within) and it's poetic metaphors, perhaps.. Always aware of the shadow around all things; living in the moment.’

There is a sense of immediateness and vitality to Bill’s prints - almost as if his late start has been coupled with a drive that far too often alludes younger artists. In the