neo:residency Artist – Sponsored by GreatArt

A Catch up with Rowan Siddons

The fourth winner of the annual neo: residency was 24 year old Rowan Siddons. He is currently completing his MA in Fine Art at Camberwell College of Arts, London.

Rowan has been working for twelve weeks in the Bolton studios of not-for-profit, artist-led group neo:artists, using the town and its historic buildings as inspiration for his 2D and 3D works.

GreatArt is proud to support the residencies with a substantial materials budget for the artist, in addition to the annual prize. Becoming steadily more popular, the prizes attract submissions from across the world and Rowan’s residency award is a fantastic achievement in the light of such high quality competition.

Rowan says of his experience

‘What began as complete disbelief soon flourished into what could only be described as a magical experience. At the beginning, I spent a lot of time saying: “I don’t believe I am here, this is too good to be true”. After finding out that I had been fortunate enough to win and was going to be artistically freed from the constraints of society for 12 weeks, I felt that I would truly be able to immerse myself into my art – which I did.

One of the fundamental, key factors of winning the prize was that I attained a deep sense of belief in myself and my artwork, and an understanding that “I can do this, people believe in me”. I can’t thank Neoartists enough for giving me this incredible, confidence boosting, artistic opportunity. I spent 14 hours a day thinking ‘art’, creating ‘art’ and talking ‘art’. Therefore, I feel that my overall artistic career has really had a massive boost in an overwhelmingly positive direction.’

‘Combined with the residency, GreatArt have also been extremely generous with their support in the way of art materials and support on social media. With the budget, I focused on getting a wide selection of beautiful inks and other primary tools for the etching process. It is with these materials that I will be able continue my artistic practice further into the future. It also means that I now don’t have to worry about acquiring materials. So I can really focus on the creation of my work. Less stress, better work. For this, I can’t thank you enough.’

‘Overall, the residency with support from Great Art and the University of Bolton has been the greatest of experiences. A building of the self.

If you want to check out my experience in full you can do so via my website www.rowansiddons.co.uk/blog
You can also join the journey on instagram @rowansiddons .’

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