An inspiring Artist Parent interview with Paul Rooney @paulrooney2023, an artist from Liverpool, UK.
Tell us about yourself?
I was trained as a painter in Scotland but early on I changed to making video and sound work, with a bit of performing and writing. Since I changed to this way of working I have always worked in a home studio, which makes things a little easier if you are a parent. I did a lot of moving around doing residencies and fellowships before our first child was born (2006), but have only done one residency since, and that one was only because it had a flat attached, so the family could come and stay. I make work as my main job, so I am very lucky, working for commission usually, which has recently mostly been sound installations in historic or heritage sites, but I also put out record releases on my own label.
How has being a parent had a positive impact on your artistic practice?
Being a creative person, who is also self employed, can make you a little bit self-involved and obsessive, sometimes to an unhealthy extent. Having a child, or other relationships or interests that are outside of your practice and very different to it, inevitably shakes you out of your tunnel vision, which can be unhelpful to progressing your work anyway if indulged for too long. So 'doing parenting', and enjoying it for the wondrous thing that it is, gives you a perspective on your work that is very necessary. I have used my kid's voices on some of the sound works I have done, one of which was about a filmmaker cruelly making his child the subject of one of his works! So parenting can also feed into your work in a direct way if it makes sense for the work itself.
What are the challenges you have faced in your artistic practice being a parent?
Time is of course the main challenge, so early on myself and my partner agreed to take up the child rearing slack if one of us was busy, so if I was working on a commission deadline, or had to travel, my partner would look after the kids, and my flexibility in having a studio at home meant I could look after the kids when she was working for part of the week. Once they reached school age things got easier, then when they are in senior school it all gets much more hands-off, not having to collect them from school is a huge turning point! By the time I had my kids my parents where getting quite old so we tried to not use them as de-facto free child-minders early on (it just would not have been fair), but we were flexible enough to cope OK.
Any advice for other Artist Parents and how they can continue to nurture their practice?
However wonderful, and all consuming, parenthood can be you need to still carve out the time for yourself to think, and make things, so a helpful partner, or friend, or family member – who can take the kids off your hands even for an hour or two – can be crucial. Being flexible with how you work can help. For instance I ended up working into the night until 4am at one stage, taking advantage of the quiet hours for making sound work after the kids were asleep, then napping in the early afternoon before the school run. That's not for people who have a normal day job though!
Is there anything else you would like to say, share or promote?
Keep your hand in, as they say. It may seem that parenthood will swallow your creativity up whole, but it need not be like that if you find the time to keep being creative somehow, and as parenting gradually gets easier and less time consuming you will be able to develop that creativity more and more. I think you end up a better artist for it.
I have a show called the Broken Token one that opens 19th October in Plymouth @theboxplymouth https://www.theboxplymouth.com/events/exhibitions/paul-rooney-broken-token.
Thank you to Paul for sharing his story and thank you for reading. If you would like to read more stories or for your work to be shared then follow and tag @artist_parent on Instragam.
Uploaded 10th October 2024