Pop Spider Magic

Johnny Romeo is a hard working painter with his eye to the classic pop of the sixties. He talks about reviving the superhero myths of his childhood, his love of paint and his new exhibition.

Spiderbait! Is this a show about Spiderman?

Yes totally!!! But there is also an underlying theme about it too. The series dwells on the failures of global consumerism, media saturation and celebrity fetish.

Not unlike Barbara Kruger’s ‘We Don’t Need Another Hero’, the ‘Spiderbait’ series provokes piercingly satirical energy in reinforcing the concept of chaotic consumerism. 

The theme of the works is mostly a statement that salvation will come in the form of a superhero… the superhero being ourselves!

I read recently that superheroes are like the Greek Gods of our time. What do you love about superheroes?

My images are often recollections of my childhood. Those impressionable things we saw as kids that somehow never quite left us. 

I did a lot of my growing up in front of the TV watching superheroes with extraordinary superhuman powers protecting the public against menacing villains. I grew up admiring and idolizing them. I yearned to become a super-hero. Tell me a kid that didn’t?

My works are about just that - the way we connect with pop culture. As kids, we connected with pop culture and as adults we all are still very much connected.

Just recently 1580 superheroes gathered in Los Angeles to break the Guinness World Record for the number of heroes in one location. Superheroes have become the new athletes and entertainers of our day. We’ve rediscovered them. Everybody identifies with them and in the near future we could all be superheroes just for one day. 

What's the appeal of Americana in your vision?

It’s not so much Americana as it is Popular Culture. Pop culture has always fascinated and intrigued me. Much of my work today deals with the rise of the mass media and the fall or decline of the individual. The ‘death of the human’ and the development of new perspectives on society, knowledge, discourse and power. I constantly grapple with the critiques of modernity - modern life, modern living and modern thoughts. People call my work expressive pop and urban. I like to think of it as reflective realism.

I mean it’s really hard to lose a pure pop mentality whist we’re living a truly pure pop reality!! I’m very interested in themes and techniques drawn from popular mass culture, such as advertising, comic books and mundane cultural objects and imagery. I love banal or kitschy elements of pop culture.  I’m also interested in the use and juxtaposition of words and symbols and the clever use of irony. Products, labelling, brand names, icons and logos all intrigue me immensely. All these things have significance to me because they’re so much a part of our everyday lives. They are so much a part of my process as they are of my life.  I thrive off that energy.  

I’m never alone whilst I’m in a shopping centre, newsagency, reading a magazine, watching a movie or television show, etc. My works are about just that - the way we connect with pop culture. 

How would you describe your colour palette? 

My work is about pulsating colour and celebrating the trivialisation of pop culture. I love expansive use of colour, bold colours and flat colours like advertising. I love the way colours combine together. 

My work combines vibrant combinations of colour, objects and line. Words and the play on words are also prevalent in my works. Beat poets figure prominently in my consciousness. Painting for me results from a poem in my mind which is painted out in the fast syncopated style of beat poetry. 

What's the power and meaning of colour for you?

For me, colour needs to be powerful and it needs to have an impact. It needs to pack a punch! Picasso was my earliest influence. He was an incredible colourist who blew my then young and impressionable mind. I carried a Picasso book with me for about 7 years. I carried it everywhere and never put it down. Eventually I changed it for a book on Matisse. Those guys were pure colour. They didn’t paint colour, they felt it. I would hope people see that colour in my work. I recently saw Mark Rothko’s work at the Museum of Art in Hong Kong. The colours were so intense that I virtually couldn’t speak for hours. Colour needs to be felt! It needs to be life changing!

What do you say to people who think it's anachronistic to be painting in a retro pop way?

It possibly is - you’re probably right, but from my experience pop really has never died. If anything, there seems to be a resurgence in it!!! People can’t get enough of it. I guess it’s because we are so immersed in pop culture. Everybody understands it because it surrounds us. We live in it and we live with it. Pop is modern life, its modern living. To a certain degree, we construct our identities from the vast array of images that pop culture immerses us in. Colours make us feel alive. They help define who we are and how we feel on a day to day basis. This is what pop is all about. 

Recently, I heard Tracey Enim talk at the Art Gallery of NSW and I guess she put it best when describing her work. She compared her work to dancers at a party or wedding. She said her work was not like the first couple of the evening who got up and danced so perfectly, so gracefully that they scared everybody else from taking to the dance floor. She much preferred the couple who got up and were a lot more spontaneous, loose and relaxed. Everybody then felt at ease and felt they all could get up and have a go. 

I kind of feel much the same way. Pop art is a bit like that. It’s accessible and fun! It doesn’t scare people off and I guess that’s what people see in it and like about it.

What do you love about paint?

Well, being a painter I must admit the painting process itself. Painting. The process. The resolution. The solitude. The jubilation. Nothing comes close. 100% total adrenalin! If you’re a painter, you’ll know what I mean. If you’re not, it’s one of those things you must do in this lifetime.

There is such an adrenalin rush, which charges your body when you’re painting. You’ve worked for days upon days battling against the canvas; your sensory awareness is peaking as you’re most engaged. Then there’s the fight, knowing what to work in, sensing what to work over, you battle and battle - and finally victory! You’ve won and that’s such a rush!

What's a typical day like for you as a painter?

I stroll down King Street on my way to the studio. Stop to grab a coffee and forever meeting new people or catching up with friends or stopping to check out what someone is doing, writing, exhibiting, playing, drawing, wearing, or selling. I suck up that magical energy which is Newtown. I carry this with me into my day or evening and into my studio. It puts me into the right frame of mind every time!!!

I work everyday for eight hours. That’s seven days a week. I clock on every time I start to work and clock off every time I take a break. When the clock hits 8 hours I start to wrap things up for the day. 

What are you looking forward to on the Gold Coast?

No rain!!! It hasn’t stopped in Sydney and hopefully a bit of sun. 19 Karen is a really great gallery run by some really amazing people. It’s a fun, creative and innovative gallery environment with great openings. I’m really looking forward to seeing the works hung - plus the opening should be massive!!!

What’s the soundtrack to this exhibition?

Definitely ‘Heroes’ by David Bowie.

Spiderbait by Johnny Romeo

19 Karen 
19 Karen Ave
Mermaid Beach
Goldcoast QLD

opens on Saturday 20 November 2010, 6-8pm
 
runs through to 18 December 2010