BILLY CHILDISH

Based in Kent, England, Childish’s artistic practice is wide ranging and prolific. In addition to painting, the artist moves seamlessly between poetry and prose, punk rock, blues, and folk music, photography, multiples, and printmaking. Over the course of his decades-long career he has published 5 novels and more than 40 volumes of confessional poetry, and recorded well over 170 LPs. Childish’s oil paintings are highly recognizable and often characterized by their striking immediacy. The artist begins each work by sketching the underlying composition in quick, intuitive charcoal and then paints wet-on-wet using his signature, earth-toned palette. His subjects are frequently drawn from his immediate environment—the North Kent landscape, the chalk cliffs of Margate, members of his family—but can also derivearrive from further afield, including scenes from the Austrian alps, the Pacific Northwest, or historical photographs. Seen through Childish’s lens, these subjects are rendered at their most essential, appearing timeless and permanent.