Rhiwbina Library started it all

Rhiwbina-based artist and designer David Hopkins, recalls some of the experiences and events and that have influenced and contributed towards the artworks that he now produces and sells, which put a different perspective on familiar subjects.

Do you sometimes reflect how you got to where you are now? Was there a plan? Or did it just happen? In my case, I think it just happened, but now I’m not so sure. It appears that I’m revisiting what I started doing almost a lifetime ago, so maybe the plan was having an interest that stays with you through the good and the bad, an interest that prompts you to go in certain directions without you even realising.

My interest in strong, direct, stark, graphic imagery was stimulated by borrowing books from Rhiwbina library when I was 6 or 7 years old. There was a series of books about professions that had chapter titles featuring very distinctive illustrations, they seemed to be part photograph and part drawing, but they left an impression that made me want to understand how these were done, so I could do them myself.

So, around 50 years ago, I embarked on a one-year Foundation Course at Cardiff College of Art, as it was then. The course involved all sorts of creative activities from ceramics to screen printing, from fine art to photography. The course was intended to push students in a direction of travel that interested them. At the time it seemed that one of the few avenues open to those who were half decent at art in school was to become an art teacher. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, it’s just that what is now called the ‘creative industry’ was only just starting to become a genuine career choice with a variety of opportunities and very few people seemed to know what those opportunities could be.

The course back then explained the different options, and I was keen to see what was available. I might even be able to recreate some of those images from the books in the library! Photography was a definite option, and I spent far too much time wandering around Cardiff and the surrounding area with a borrowed SLR camera taking black and white pictures of things I thought were interesting. I developed the negatives and printed the photographs myself, either in the darkroom in college, or in my own facility cobbled together in the loft of my parents’ bungalow in Pantmawr.

However, I found that you could often make an even more direct statement by adding context, graphics and other relevant text and informative details to the image to produce posters, books, and a whole range of other visually attractive media to generate interest and grab attention.

At the end of the Foundation Course, I therefore studied two-dimensional design for three years in Cardiff and eventually spent over 35 years in the graphic design and advertising industry, both here and overseas, ending up

establishing and running The Info Group design and marketing agency from our offices in Heol-y-Coed.

In fact, from our small, understated studio in Rhiwbina we dealt with thousands of requests from large educational clients including the universities of Cardiff, Swansea, East Anglia, Winchester and University College London. We’d develop marketing campaigns with international healthcare brands and create posters for some of South Wales’ most respected art groups as well as award winning exhibitions and promotions for the National Museums of Wales and the Welsh Government. Who knew that Rhiwbina could be such a hotbed of creative output!

Having now sold that business, I’ve been working as a designer and artist producing artworks that have their roots in my initial interest of photography, as well as photographs themselves, both from that period of fifty years ago and colour images that are more contemporary. Some of this work was exhibited recently at an exhibition in Blackwater Gallery in Cardiff Bay, as I was introduced as one of three New Welsh Artists, which is somewhat ironic given that I could be retired.

I’ve been looking back at more of the work that has been sitting in a drawer until recently and producing prints that should look good on a wall anywhere. I’ve set up a website that sells artworks, photographs and a range of other products that are strong, colourful and have impact.

The images can scream a bit and are printed, hence Screamprint, which is the name I use for the online shop. Pay a visit and see what’s on offer, I know that artwork can be very subjective, but if you like what you see, I’m working on more artworks to add to the collection.

There may well be an off-the-wall image that would look good on your wall, and all that follows a visit to Rhiwbina library to borrow a book, that sparked an interest that lasted a lifetime.

You can visit the Screamprint site here.