Her love of art literally started in the nursery. Among her earliest influences were the iconic colour illustrations of Margaret Tarrant, best known for her work on Charles Kingsley’s The Water Babies. Another childhood favourite was wildlife painter Charles Tunnicliffe, who illustrated Tarka The Otter and later worked on the Ladybird What To Look For series.
Today, she cites French Impressionist giant Edouard Manet as a major influence, which is unsurprising, but also Jenny Saville, celebrated for her monumental paintings of female nudes. “She’s absolutely fabulous. I like anybody who really throws the paint around and isn’t afraid. I don’t really like neat colouring in, so I like the bold strokes of people with a flair.”
Going her own way and fulfilling her dream did not mean enrolling full-time at art school, however. “I say I’m largely self-taught because I’m not art school-trained. But I have had some fantastic teachers for years and years.”
Among her helpmates are husband and wife artists Anne Anderson and Drummond Mayo. Mr Mayo would organise Thursday evening life drawing classes in the couple’s home. Another person offering guidance and friendly tutoring was artist and gallerist Ann Johnston. “She taught me colour,” says Ms Drummond. “She was fabulous. So while I’m not art school trained I have been learning for many, many years and I hope to continue to learn until I drop.”
Before that unhappy date there is the not-so-small matter of Ms Drummond’s upcoming solo show at the Annan Gallery in Glasgow’s West End. It gathers together around 40 works, mostly her vivid, signature still lifes of flowers, plus around half a dozen portraits made using her favourite model, a young Russian girl who has since returned to the Motherland.
“Figurative art was my passion for years and years but I went into the floral still lifes because all the colour was there – and it was nice having the flowers in the house! But it was so much easier than figurative work and I liked the change. It’s a different challenge.”
The new show also contains one large landscape, a relative departure for Ms Drummond. It’s a painting of Ballochruin Bridge near Killearn. “I walk there with my dogs. I love the landscape around here, so when I can I do pastel sketches then work them up at home. But it’s not something I have been known for.”
What she is known for is a painting technique which dispenses with brushes and instead employs an even more rudimentary instrument – the finger.
“I don’t mix the paint, I paint directly onto the board with my fingers and I mix on the board because I need the speed,” she explains. “I needed to do that for painting from life because I didn’t like to revisit a pose, I liked to get the essence of something in one shot. That needed real speed.”
The technique initially developed from problems she encountered using a palette knife. “I couldn’t get a proper curved line,” she says. “And with the brush I’m too lazy – my red brush just became like the colour of mud. But I got clean colour with my fingers because you can just wipe them on your clothes.”
There is a downside to the finger technique, though. “It’s very poisonous,” she confides. “You’re not supposed to.”
Then again, who ever got anywhere without breaking a few rules?
Marion Drummond: Solo Exhibition opens at the Annan Gallery, Glasgow on April 12 (until May 4
