Toby Mulligan
"A Man Apart"
Toby Mulligan
A man on a plane
There are so many people in the world and we see them every day.
In shops, cars, the media and where we go during our daily existence.
I was in an airport recently and was just looking at the people there. It is extraordinary the differences between us all and yet to the casual observer we all just mix in to the throng......
And then you spot someone a little bit detached from that aforementioned throng.
So I am standing waiting for the call to board and I spot a tall man with an upright pose and I watch him looking at someone and constantly looking down at his ipad.
Curious, I walk over to him and as all good people do, look over his shoulder and there this man is, casually and without furtiveness, 'painting' the subject he is looking at on his ipad.
A conversation ensues and continues on the plane journey and lo and behold, I have met and travelled with Toby Mulligan, painter, father and thinker.
Toby Mulligan was born in London in 1969.
He was a budding artist at an early age and as a child spent hours carving dancing figures from off cuts of wood he found. Toby then became inspired by Roald Dahls 'The Wonderful World of Henry Sugar' and how the power of the mind is an incredible tool. After an aborted attempt at developing his own special powers (including staring at candles for hours and breathing salt water up his nose) Toby accepted improved concentration as the Roald Dahl gift.
He had his first exhibition at the age of 14 and his first London exhibition at 17.
Toby was always an artist but societies intervention ("There's no money in being an artist", "It's a waste of time"), Toby took up a method of earning a living.
He moved to France where he renovated his own property but never stopped creating.
During this time Toby taught in a graphic design studio but was still creating art.
Toby now lives in London with his son and is a full time artist. (I argue that he has always been an artist, merely interupted by priorities of family and finance) and is getting the recognition that his talent deserves.
Toby Mulligan cannot be bracketed, in as much as he IS a landscape painter, he is a portrait painter, he is a sculptor and he uses mixed media; oil, watercolours, pencil and iPad.
In so many this is a negative but with Toby there is a positivity in this approach.
He stays fresh, alert to possibilities and it allow him to be a part of the process instead of the 'ruler' of the process.
You only need to listen to Toby talk to glimpse his philosophy.
"I love being absorbed in my creativity"
"I love oil, it is luscious, sexy."
When I create my imagination takes over."
Toby Mulligan is a highly personable man. Charming, intelligent, he thinks before answering, he listens and contemplates before engaging you.
But what about the artist?
Is his methodology an extension of his social character or does he have a little of the 'Pollock' about him?
I can only write on limited personal information and conversations but Toby is an artist that we all want to be.
Toby has calmed his persona by his own admission, he decided that he needed to grow as a person and an artist for his own good and creativity.
"I used to work for three days solid. I thought I was going mad" he states very matter of factly and openly. "I couldn't exist, I didn't eat or sleep".
"I realised that I wasn't consistant, as a person or an artist".
"But having a family grounded me, there was no more disappearing into the ether".
I asked him if this was not detrimental to his art?
His response was thoughtful as always. "When I came back to London from France I wanted a clean slate, "I want to show to myself you can be both intense and be human".
This article can be read in full in Septembers Issue of L'Artiste Magazine.
Toby Mulligan will be exhibiting at a private exhibition in Petersfield in October of this year.