sign up • log in • working with jotta

> search jotta

By Barnaby Tidman and Millie Ross published on Wednesday, 27 January

Type "Chris Ofili and Chelsea School of Art" into Google Images and the first item found is Steve Dowson's "Studio", 1989-1990. The painting features Dowson in the foreground staring intently at the viewer and in the background among the shambolic studio, a young Chris Ofili, busy painting away.

"I remember very clearly the work Chris made at Chelsea - his first year work was in a consciously naeve figurative style reminiscent of Ken Kiff, but of course Ofili's protagonists were invariably African" Dowson tells jotta. "Chris often made self-portraits and in retrospect I see this as having been an analysis and reinforcement of his identity. I remember a work from the second year (the time I painted my picture), a large square self-portrait surrounded by eyes - even then I think we must have all been looking at him in expectation of what he would do next.

"Chris invited me to the dinner at Tate Britain last night along with other ex-Chelsea students of the same year who have all done well artistically (Neal Tait, Steve Claydon, Simon Ling, and Mark Pearson)," continues Dowson, "which is typical of Chris; he is a very thoughtful and generous individual who remains loyal to his old friends."

"What set Chris apart from other students when he was at Chelsea was the sense of fun and playfulness in his work." Recalls Waldemar Januszczak, who worked at Chelsea School of Art (as it was called then) as a technician. This attitude was at odds with the Head of Painting at the time, Clyde Hopkins, and the general art-school mood of reverence towards the form: "Everyone took art very serioulsy, but Chris thought it should be fun; Clyde Hopkins identified this very early on."

"He was continually working in the studio. He was an obsessive painter." Recalls Brian Chalkley, then the Course Senior Lecturer in Painting at Chelsea School of Art, (curent Director MA Fine Art and Postgraduate Co - Ordinator). Chalkley asked Chris to teach on a regular basis when still based at the original campus on Manresa Road. Chalkley suggested the idea initially to Clyde Hopkins, who said he was too young for the job. Ignoring this advice Chalkley went ahead and was pleased with the young artist's results- "He was a very enthusiastic teacher who would often arrive with art books for the students to look at."

Meanwhile, Ofili had quickly established a reputation in the local art scene as an interesting painter and courted this attention. "'Give them what they want, so I can make a career as a painter'" was how Januszczak descrbed Ofili's direct approach to work. "He was a Northern lad, from a different background than the art establishment, but rather than having it in for them, or being cynical, he enjoyed it and thought hard about how he could be a successful painter."

Dowson recalls: "In the first week at Chelsea School of Art in 1988, Chris and I made the journey to visit the Saatchi Gallery; it was there we saw the late works of Philip Guston for the first time and Chris immediately recognised the power and sophistication of those paintings. I don't think it can be under-estimated the influence Guston's late work have had on our generation." Dowson tells jotta, "A painting in the final room of the current Tate show reminded me of a very Guston-style painting Chris produced in the third year at Chelsea based on the African torturer in a Giotto flagellation of Christ; the painting at Tate shows a large figure apparently whipping another, smaller figure with a rose."

Along with our timeline search online for Ofili's paintings and trace a line from his figurative student works, to his more 'dangerous and exciting' Sensation pieces. These had the famous addition of elephant dung- although Ofili had always used a varitety of textures on his canvases, including glitter and map pins, end with his current work at the Tate, a return to his figurative style.

Ofili's journey from starving student (or so the romantic notion goes), to national icon.

1968: Born, 10th October in Manchester.

1988-1991: Studies Fine Art at Chelsea School of Art.

1991-1993: Studies Masters at Royal College of Art.

1992: Wins British Council travel scholarship to Zimbabwe. Absorbs ancient cave paintings.

1997: Included in Charles Saatchi's Sensation show.

1998: Wins Turner Prize, with paintings such as No Woman No Cry, concerning the Stephen Lawrence murdercase.

2003: Selected to represent Britain at the Venice Biennale with Within Reach. Created in collaboration with the architect David Adjaye.

2005: The Upper Room, a specially made, walnut-lined room with 13 paintings of rhesus macaque monkeys, is bought by the Tate gallery.

The Freeness project (kick-started by Ofili) launches in London, with live music events in London's 'Plastic People' club, with the aim of giving exposure to non-mainstream music.

Moves to Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean.

2007: Exhibits Devil's Pie in New York, which includes sculpture works that depict the biblical moment of the Annunciation (the Angel Gabriel revealing to Mary that she will bear the Son of God).

2010: Mid-career retrospective at Tate Britain.

 

To celebrate the opening of the exhibition and to make the works open to all, Tate Britain has created a special youth ticket: anyone under the age of 26 can enter the exhibition for £5 – usual price is £10 full price and £8.50 for concessions. Just bring along some ID to get this special offer. www.tate.org.uk or call 0207 887 8888