Interview 'Art By Artists' Podcast

Transcript of audio interview:

Hello, my name is Julika Pettigrew, I am an architect turned abstract artist, and I am recording this on September 16th, 2024.

I am based in London, UK, where I have been living for nearly 20 years, but I was actually born in Germany.

I grew up in a village, surrounded by fields and woods and have been creative from a very early age - starting with conker people, making furniture and sewing clothes for my Barbie doll - I was always making something…

It was a very sheltered and peaceful upbringing. My parents enrolled me in extracurricular art classes from a young age, it was all very slow-paced, and also quite mono cultural.

For my a levels at school I had to choose two main subjects, and I went for the combination Maths and Art. I was the only one, it was considered very unusual.

But it was no wonder with a physicist and a musician teacher as parents, and I loved the balance between structure and creativity and it turned out that it was perfect for the direction I was going to take at uni: interior architecture.

My biggest influences are…

Firstly, the architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, a pioneer of modern, minimalist architecture who coined the aphorism “Less is more”

I often approach the composition of a painting like the layout of a floor plan.

Secondly, my work is influenced by nature: landscape, plants and light. I am very much drawn to a palette of greens and blues.

My childhood home is still my happy place!

After I finished my course, I moved to London to start work in a firm of architects and designers. I loved creating spaces for people to learn and work. My favourite part was choosing colours, textures and materials for the interior finishes.

After my first child was born, I ended up giving up work, though - before the pandemic, aspects like flexibility and working from home were very difficult.

My second child has now started school, so I have had the chance to pick up painting again more seriously. It has only been a few months, really, but I love having art in my life more these days. Currently I am focusing on injecting my colour palettes with some autumnal red tones, and I am always working on creating layers and depth with my mark making.

The biggest challenge as an artist, I find for me personally, is having too many painting ideas in my head at once. So while I AM working on a few pieces simultaneously, finding clarity is a challenging process at times.

The advice I would give to my younger self:

“You are good enough”

Meditate and use breathwork to find your limiting beliefs and your true self - then the best and most authentic art happens as well!

I would say my most unconventional techniques happen when I raid the kitchen for utensils and pieces of recycling for my mark making. Think fruit nets, foam rolls and potato masher. Mainly, though, I apply paint with the self made scrapers I cut from polycarbonate sheets 20 years ago at uni. Back then, before computer aided design, we had to hand paint interior perspective views of our design proposals. I love these scrapers because you can apply paint really thickly and textured, especially if my custom mixed paints have dried out a little and have become thicker in their pots.

In terms of background noise while working, I am happy to have silence slash faint noises from my environment, but I also enjoy listening to podcasts. My favourite one currently is Nicholas Wilton’s Art 2 Life Podcast.

I love his approach to art and life.

The best reaction someone has had to my art was “it makes me happy looking at it!”

What do you hope people take away from your artwork?

I believe that is the best thing people can take away from it, otherwise I would hope that viewers feel drawn in into the details of my art, and feel a sense of balance and peace

Thank you, Stan, for reaching out and inviting me to do this interview. For everyone who has made it this far, thanks for listening - do stop by on my instagram profile Julika underscore Pettigrew underscore art, I love interacting with other artists and everyone interested in art, so I hope to see you there! Bye!