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Tony Bryant
Malaga
Friday, 13 December 2024, 15:18
Hosting a first solo exhibition in a renowned location can be a daunting experience for many artists, but not for Siobhan Riordan, a Malaga-based painter who is staging her first solo collection of work at the La Concepción botanical gardens from next week. Her only concern was that she could produce enough work in time for the collection, which includes around 20 pieces.
Born in Birmingham, England, in 1980, Siobhan arrived in Malaga in 2004, where she began to establish herself on the local art scene, participating in collective exhibitions in the city, Tolox, Benalmádena and Marbella, among other places.
She began painting in primary school and it was in secondary school that she began focusing on art. Siobhan, daughter of a Jamaican father, who was a painter and musician, and an Irish mother, did a bachelor's degree in illustration and printmaking and came to Spain straight out of university to study Spanish in Seville.
"I was living in Ireland for a while and I decided I wanted to travel to South America, so I took up a Spanish evening course. Then an opportunity became available to live with a Spanish family in Seville, which was part of an educational programme. I absolutely loved Seville, it is such a great city," she explains to SUR in English.
After her intensive three-month course in Seville, Siobhan had every intention to return to the UK, but she ended up taking a job with a travel company at Malaga Airport. She met her Spanish partner José the same year she arrived in Malaga, and she "just fell in love". José is not an artist, although Siobhan claims "it might be better if he was".
"He has to put up with my artistic temperament, but it's fine. He is very good at helping me make frames and prepare for exhibitions, even though he doesn't like to attend them," she says, bursting into laughter.
She began teaching English at local academies in Malaga as a sideline, which she says "comes naturally" for her as she loves reading. She also loves jazz music and started singing around ten years ago.
"I've always been an artist; the singing came later. I joined a choir and I found that I had a good voice, so I began training at the Malaga jazz school, and eventually started performing, but this is more like a hobby," she says.
The 44-year-old says she is influenced by Jean-Michel Basquiat, an artist who rose to success during the '80s as part of the Neo-expressionism movement in Manhattan, and which included key figures like Francis Bacon. The work in her latest exhibition has changed direction from some of her previous collections, such as Blackness, a series of paintings that promoted a positive image of black people throughout history and underlined the cultural contribution of black residents to Malaga society.
Today, she says "nature is where I belong, amongst the forests, beside the rivers, atop the mountains". It is in these places that she finds her deepest connections, so it is no wonder that her desire to paint who she is has transformed into painting nature.
"We were in lockdown and I was doing a lot of portraits for Sky Arts. Then, one day a friend sent me a bunch of flowers. I started going over in my mind about the life cycle of plants. I also joined a spiritual group, which helped connect me with nature. It just kept calling out to me the need to express myself in a way that wasn't a figurative portrait," she explains in a deep Brummie accent.
Siobhan says that the expressiveness of her work is a reflection of her character and the life she brings forth onto the canvas.
Working with "vibrations", she expresses emotions and feelings onto the canvas, "only to later cover it up with something more subtle".
"I loved Basquiat's expressiveness and the quickness with which he painted. I've recently become a lot more expressive, abstract and fluid and strong with my lines. I ask myself whilst I paint: How much do I want to say, what do I tell? How much can I open up, release?" she concludes.
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