Gareth Southwell is a freelance philosopher, illustrator and author. He started the brilliant thinkers’ resource Philosophy Online in 2000 as a means of supporting the students he was tutoring at the time and it has developed into an active philosophy forum and blog, with reviews, discussions and books for students and those generally interested in the subject…
Southwell is currently writing a series of introductory philosophy books for Blackwells: so far ‘beginners guides’ to Descartes and Nietzsche have been published. I spoke with him about his interest in drawing, the useful connections between text and illustration, and his diverse selection of projects.
Gareth Southwell, self portrait
What got you interested in drawing? Is it something you’ve been doing since childhood?
You always hear artists talking about how they’ve always been drawing, you couldn’t keep a pencil or brush out of their hands, etc. I wasn’t like that: art for me wasn’t the expression of some innate and irrepressible urge to doodle or create. I found out early on that I enjoyed copying things, mostly comics and cartoons. I loved Asterix with an almost religious intensity, and would copy the characters there – Uderzo is such a brilliant cartoonist. Later I got into comics that my mum would bring me back from work – Spiderman was my fave, then Star Wars, and occasionally the Hulk. One formative experience was being ill with German Measles. You aren’t allowed to leave the house because of light sensitivity – or that’s what my mother reckoned! – so I stayed in for weeks, minded by my grandfather, and I just drew and drew. Actually, I copied Star Wars figures – the actual toys – I had loads of them…So, drawing must be therapeutic for me, I guess!
Do you think it’s possible for anyone to learn to draw, kinda like riding a bike, or do you have to have a knack for it? Or is it a bit of both, perhaps? (Or perhaps you agree with Molly Crabapple that riding a bike is nigh on impossible?)
When someone displays a talent, then the first reaction of other people is often to ask where it came from: your father, mother, uncle, grandad, etc. So, there is a common assumption that talent is innate – or genetic, as we would now say. I think there isn’t yet enough research to determine exactly what influence your genes have on cognitive and practical abilities (i.e. skills such as art), but I tend to doubt that there is an ‘artist’s gene’, or that genetic inheritance can determine a skill like that so precisely. So, I think it’s probably developmental: everyone is capable of it, but due to early life experiences, some develop it and some don’t so much. Early teaching experiences are important here – so many people have been put off by their experiences of art in school – but I think it begins earlier than that: just as some kids prefer reading a book to going to the beach, or making things to singing or dancing, so some kids prefer to draw. That preference, and the attitude they develop to what they do, are vital. I started by copying, and that got me praise which built my confidence. There’s probably also a knack involved here – drawing what you see as opposed to what you think you should see – but it is a knack that people can learn (or relearn). An excellent book here is “Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain”, by Betty Edwards, where she actually teaches ‘non-artists’ to draw. It’s amazing. So, yes, everyone can!
Gareth Southwell, 'Freud'
Did you study art or illustration formally? Do you think it’s necessary to do that? How about philosophy? Is a university education essential in getting something out of / making a contribution to philosophy?
I studied art in school, and then took it as one of my A levels – for those outside the UK, that’s the non-compulsory schooling between 16 and 18 that prepares you for Uni. However, though I toyed with doing a degree in art – I almost applied to do the foundation course everyone does to prepare for art school – I ultimately decided to study English instead, which eventually turned into philosophy. So, most of what I’ve learnt in art has been through self-teaching – I had some interesting and supportive art teachers, but I never really learnt much in school – I think teachers are too busy trying to stop people climbing out the windows! But even at A level there was little formal teaching on – e.g. – perspective, using different media, painting techniques, etc. I guess there might have been had I gone on, but English was just much easier to be good at! I then came back to art in my 20s, and have been trying to improve ever since – still am.
However, I do feel that I’ve missed out on a lot of things that I could have learnt earlier, and it’s been a hard slog to catch up. But as to what it’s necessary to learn, it depends on the artist: there are different skill sets that different styles require – cartoonists don’t really need perspective, etc., so much, but they do need a really good grasp on conveying facial expression, for instance. As to where or how they learn these things, I don’t think it matters, but there are essential skills, I think.
As for philosophy, once again it depends what you want from it. Being involved in academic philosophy definitely requires formal training, because it’s a quite exclusive club, and they’re a bit snooty about enthusiastic amateurs! However, I would definitely say that philosophy in a more general sense is something that we can all do – and in fact, do do (‘do do’? That’s what studying English gets you!). We all philosophise occasionally, and perhaps people are doing so now more than ever, with more and more people working in communication and media, and doing work which doesn’t require backbreaking physical toil. So – this is the optimist speaking here – more free time and conscious choice regarding what we do with our lives, will result in more questioning. Some people are a bit scared by philosophy, or else they think it’s pointless – it’s, like, weird, you know? But think about it: we are hairless apes, the only creatures to have evolved rational conscious thought on the only planet for millions of light years that is capable of sustaining life, and which in a universe of mind-boggling vastness may even be unique. Given these facts, wouldn’t it be ‘weird’ for anyone not to think about such things?
You often combine text with your own images, for example in your excellent range of introductory philosophy books for Blackwells. What comes first in your working process, text or image? Do you have any thoughts on the hierarchies of text and image more generally?
Well, in terms of the Blackwell books, the images come last. This is just because their purpose is primarily to illustrate the points made in the text, and to lighten the tone of what are sometimes quite dry and difficult topics (I’ll write more on this in response to your next question). However, for other projects, it’s different. A lot of my stuff is caricature, so I get a fair amount of commissions from people simply wanting a picture of someone to accompany text. Often, you don’t know what the text will be, so you have to sort of hedge your bets as regards how you portray people. So, for instance, I might be asked to caricature Heidegger, and it might be tempting here to make a reference to his membership of the Nazi party, but that would be a risk (the text might make no reference to this – in which case it’s distracting). So, unless you see the text first, or can run a rough sketch past someone (which there’s not always time to do), then you have to play it safe.
Aside from this, I’m working on a private comic book project. I love comics, and I think there is real potential to use text and images in a distinct way. Comics convey something different, and you’re obviously not just illustrating or accompanying words with pretty pictures; you’re communicating in a different way. People will read comics who don’t really read books, which is great I think. However, I’m finding it really hard make progress – words and images are getting in the way of each other! I can write, and I can draw, but comics involve a third skill, which is sort of a visualisation of events – more like making a film, I suppose – and I’m currently struggling to develop that skill. However, I’d love to do more comics stuff. There’s some great stuff out there explaining philosophy in comic book form: Logicomix (http://www.logicomix.com/en/) is about the search for the philosophical foundations of mathematics, Epicurus the Sage (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epicurus_the_Sage) is a lighthearted history of the Greek philosopher Epicurus, and of course there are the series of Introducing… books, which are great. So, that is my next step, I think. Anyone wanting to collaborate, contact me!
Also on the philosophy books… What are the benefits of combining text and image in the way that you do? To engage a wider readership, to entertain, to aid memory and understanding?
For the Blackwell books, the point – as mentioned above – is mostly to break up the text and to help lighten the tone of the book. A lot of academic philosophers think that the purpose of writing philosophy books – even for beginners – is to show how clever you are! This is really what got me in to writing this type of book in the first place, because I realised that there were really quite few accessible books for beginners and students. So, the cartoons and caricatures are just a way of saying, “Hey! Lighten up!” Occasionally – and this is what I’d like to do more of with comics – I get to use images to convey things visually that would be more difficult, or less effective, to convey verbally. So, instead of saying, “Foundationalism is the view that looks for one truth on which to build all our knowledge”, you can just draw an upside-down pyramid! This is so effective, and also of course aids both memory and understanding, because images will stick where words won’t.
Do you think art is a luxury or a necessity?
We all need luxuries, but there may not be a logically sound reason for having them. Shakespeare puts this beautifully (this is one of my favourite quotes): “O, reason not the need! Our basest beggars are in the poorest thing superfluous”. In other words, once you start asking what we do and don’t really need, then you’ll find that there is perhaps no necessary reason for even the most basic things that we have. This is a reductive approach, and is one of the sad tendencies that philosophy and science sometimes seem prone to. As Nietzsche puts it (another favourite quote), there is always someone who “in the end always prefers a handful of ‘certainty’ to a whole cartload of beautiful possibilities”.
Give me beautiful uncertainty any day! Ultimately, then, it comes down to acknowledging that there aren’t reasons for everything, and reason has its limits.
Gareth Southwell, 'Bertrand Russell'
I seem to be attracted to doing interviews with supremely creative multi-taskers. Recently I’ve spoken to Rosalind Davis (painter, gallery manager, writer, educator); Ms Crabapple (artist, illustrator, art school chain entrepreneur, model); Noah Becker (painter, writer, magazine founder/editor, working jazz musician) and Jeffrey Lewis (touring musician, illustrator, comic book maker).
I’d like to ask you the same questions I asked them: as a writer, editor, tutor, blogger and illustrator, how do you manage to juggle so many mind-stretching tasks? What motivates you? & what, if anything, do you do to relax?
Well, I very rarely feel like I’m ticking along, multitasking smoothly – it’s a lot messier than that! I tend to have bursts of enthusiasm and industry in certain areas, resulting in inactivity in others. It’s really hard to keep lots of things going at the same time. For instance, until about a month ago, I hadn’t drawn for 3 or 4 months because I had a book deadline. However, I’m drawing a lot at the moment, so the writing has taken a back seat. So, there’s always a big struggle between my different interests and duties, and there is sometimes a resistance to switching between art-based stuff and writing/study-based stuff. I now this is a cliché now, but verbal and visual do involve different parts of the brain, and I sometimes feel that I get stuck in one mode. However, as for general time management, it’s just fire-fighting: I do what interests me until I realise that there’s a deadline in the next few weeks, and then panic and work like crazy, and then back to pottering, dreaming and scheming! As for relaxing, I don’t watch much telly, but I do watch TV drama series – which I record or get on DVD (e.g Lost, House, Lie to Me). The best situation is when the family eat together and then we settle down to watch something we all like. I’m getting back into music – I used to play a lot, but now it’s mainly listening whilst drawing (it seems to stop me thinking and writing, though). Other than that, I like walking, which is happening a lot more since we’ve got the dog.
Who or what are your drawing inspirations?
Well, I mentioned Albert Uderzo, one of the creators of Asterix, who was my first introduction to how great and fun art can be. As regards illustrators, I love Alfred Tenniel’s illustrations of Lewis Carroll’s Alice books, whose style I’ve done my damndest to steal! I also like Aubrey Beardsley, who was a beautifully mannered draughtsman, I think. William Blake is an inspiration for his individuality and determination, for the way he combines text and image, and for his total obsessive desire to control all aspects of the creative process! Other than that, the other influences are comic book artists: James Jean is just sublime; Seth Fisher, who died very young, was a wonderful talent; and Arthur Adams is perhaps my hero – a love of painstaking detail combined with fun elements of cartoon and caricature.
Do you have any upcoming publications or works of art or anything else you’d like to publicise here?
Well, I’ve just finished a book for Quercus, which is a collection of 360 philosophy quotations covering the whole history of philosophy, each with a page of explanation. This is aimed at the general reader, so I’ve tried to make it light and fun, but informative at the same time. This is out in about Feb, I think. Other than that, I’m currently finishing up the third book for Blackwell, a guide to the theory of knowledge, which will also be out sometime next year. I’ve also just done a book proposal for a collaboration with someone on some popular philosophy books, and I’ve just started developing another idea with someone else for a book on critical thinking, which I’m hoping to tie in to my website (producing extra materials, etc.). Regarding my website, I’m still on there occasionally running and contributing to the forum (or ‘phorum’, as I’ve wittily entitled it), and there are plans to redevelop sections still, which I’m hoping to have time to do later this year. I’ve also foolishly decided to tweet the history of philosophy on Twitter, which – with some long pauses – is now up to Socrates! (You can follow this using the hashtag #ATHoP – A Twit’s History of Philosophy – and check PhilosophyOnline for previous entries.)
As regards art, I’ve just opened an Etsy shop to sell off some original work and I’m currently developing a range of merchandise to sell in my shop. This isn’t a big business venture, really, just a little hobby that gives me an excuse to draw. However, I’ve started running a competition for people to suggest quotes to accompany caricatures. I’ve just done Kafka and the current one is Shakespeare. To enter, you just need to suggest a quote, and the winner gets to choose and judge the next contest, as well as getting a free mug/t-shirt/print. This is just a fun thing, really, but I’d like to keep it going if there’s interest.
Other than that, I’m looking to develop my comic idea, and to work with others on something comicky, if anyone is interested?
Would you set my readers and I a Gareth Southwell-style drawing challenge?
Well, it would have to be to do a caricature of someone – yourself, someone you know, a celebrity, etc. There are different styles of caricature – some are very simple and cartoony, some are cruel and exaggerated, and some are closer to portraiture (perhaps mine are in this latter category), so don’t feel you have to fit a particular style. Just have fun!
