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The vibrant, colourful and extraordinary artworks of Delaine and Damian LeBas are taking shape in a house in Worthing, filled with pictures and folk art. Their individual works have been labelled 'romany' and 'outsider' which, says Delaine, 'we are proud of, but both labels conjure up such strong images it makes it hard to for us to be accepted in the mainstream.'
Delaine
was born in Worthing in June 1965 and, for her, art and clothes, paint
and fabric, have always been intertwined; yet she says, 'clothes are
only clothes…pictures are something more special.' Romany gypsy on her
mother's side, she was raised amid caravans and horse trading fairs
and some of her work records aspects of itinerant gypsy life - her travels
to seasonal gypsy fairs at Epsom, Paddock Wood and Appleby.
She
had always kept collage books, filled with little bits and pieces of
fabric and this led her to the West Sussex College of Art and Design
(1981-86), where she did embroidery, printing and painting fabrics.
It was here that she met Damian. She then graduated to St Martin's School
of Art (1986-88), where she specialised in textile design and had lots
of problems. 'I was doing drawings on screen prints, patching things
together. Most students were doing boring repeatings, and were dressed
from head to toe in black. I was in colour, with sequins and embroidery.'
Two
years after graduating, she made her first pictures, in crayon and acrylic,
in vivid colours and with detailed ornamentation. She says: 'The Romany
is there in my work but mainly it's about how I feel about what I am.
I don't mind talking about my family but people have romantic ideas
about the romany life. It's a harsh, hard sort of life. You meet a lot
of racial prejudice and I've had to fight against that.' Delaine lists
her other inspirations as Monet's house at Giverny, Frida Kahlo, Guatemalan
textiles and Matisse.
She says: ' We have no fear about what we use - mixed media, recycled bits and pieces - or how we show it.' She now teaches textiles part-time at DCSE and A-level, to younger kids and BTEC college youth. She's observed that little kids can't wait to do art.
Damian was born in June 1963 into a poor, working class family near Sheffield. He is a natural story-teller and his own words bear best witness to his life.
'I
have Irish travellers in my background but also French Huegenot - LeBas
- plus the rest of my ancestors were normal English. 'My art work evolved
from when I was quite young. I was obsessed with football and I have
always supported Chelsea and Sheffield United because of strong family
ties with both clubs.
'At the age of eight or nine, I was at a match and looking at all the heads. It was art, it was happening, I was excited and tried to recreate it.' He drew hundreds of these pictures, none of which survive. 'I didn't do well at school and was chucked out with no exams at all. I was unemployed and tried loads of jobs on building sites, as a roofer, at a kettle factory and I got bored. 'A girl at the Job Centre suggested I try for West Sussex Art College and I got in without exams in 1979.
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'I was a bit of a misfit, doing football and boxing pictures. They told me I'd never be an artist but they considered me an asset as a comedian. I was a bit of a runaway train at that time and developed a reputation as a pain in the arse and a rebellious nightmare. 'The tutors did seem to understand me though and I took a year off, got back into Northern Soul and amphetamines and then they let me go back. When the assessors came, they sent me home and I got through the textiles course.
'I got more ambitious and the tutors from the RCA thought I had a bit of an edge. I got accepted but as soon as I got there - fireworks. I was too much of an individual. 'They sent me to the V&A to draw pots and I ended up drawing the builders and tea waggons outside, people diving from the top of the V&A into large cups of tea. They assessed me as sub O-level. But I met some amazing people there, working mainly in Fine Art. I was dj playing soul in the Art School bar and they picked up on what I was doing. 'I was introduced to the Outsider Archive in London and they bought almost everything I had done.
In
1987, I got a grant from the Mendelson Trust and produced a lot more
art. Since my 20s, I have had exhibitions all over the world. 'Finding
art was making the most of a bad thing. It comes out in me art. My first
work was from true feelings. I started with oil pastels, then pencils
for a long time, then acrylic paints, which dry quickly. Now I work
with lead pencil, very direct on paper.
'My mum had aneurisms and is semi-paralysed. My sister died two years ago while she was pregnant, a nephew died and my dad committed suicide a year ago. There has never been anything solid in my life, except when I'm doing a picture.
'Since
I met Delaine I have been involved in the traveller's scene, working,
living, eating and breathing the lifestyle. They're lovely people but
Delaine is an exception, a one-off. Other traveller's don't always understand
it. 'Now everything has been bricked off except up North.
At Paddock Wood Horse Fair there were armed police with machine guns. Most travellers are now on council estates, or on permanent sites or little plots of land. A real traveller is a rare thing now. It's romantic in some ways but hard. And heavy. 'There is lots of Irish in me and I went on a roots mission but it started to get a bit too much. I like George Melly and his book A Tribe of One. As an artist you've got your own background, your own personality that you've got through personal experience.'
John May
All images © Delaine & Damian LeBas
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