Ryan Lee Boultbee (b. 1996)

Ryan grew up in a small industrial village in Leicestershire. After graduating with a degree in Architecture and Built Environment, from the University of Nottingham, he started a visual art practice in the city producing several small exhibitions across the Midlands. Ryan’s work explores his disengagement with contemporary culture and the built environment. Ryan often feels lost in society; his artworks recreate this feeling by drawing attention to the forgotten, hidden, overlooked, unconsidered, or benign. He finds pulling objects, thoughts, emotions, and symbols out of their respective contexts allows him to examine their meaning and creative possibilities.

The eight unique tasks in the ME + HOME = ART activity pack have been designed “to help you to look creatively at the space you occupy every day: your home and the objects within it. The content is specifically aimed at young and emerging creatives, but the tasks are accessible to everyone.”[1]

[1] https://www.youngcreativeawards.org/masterclasses/me-home-art-ryan-boultbee-artists-activity-pack/

Ryan is primarily a drawer who digitizes his work and experiments with manipulation and colouration, focusing on contemporary culture, specifically everyday symbolism or personal thoughts and experiences. I used Ryan’s 2020 project, ME + HOME = ART as my inspiration: “eight unique tasks to help you to look creatively at the space you occupy every day: your home and the objects within it.”[1]

Ryan’s drawings are very spare, very minimal; in most cases there are few lines and large open spaces. I chose to c create a stylized outline map of the (presumed) familial village of Boltby, North Yorkshire. The lines of the map became my nod to Ryan’s drawings. In ME + HOME = ART, Ryan suggests using objects found in one’s home as art materials: boxes, bottles, cans, etc. I used empty popsicle and composting bag boxes to construct windows that direct the viewer’s eye to sections of the map. The painted strip at the bottom echoes some of the interior colours on the walls of my own home. This further addresses Ryan’s advice to use what you find in the home.

This is one of the few pieces of mine in this project that has not been created in response to a specific painting or artwork. This posed unique challenges, but I find the results satisfying.

I chose the title, “Windows on the Past” to refer back to the village of Boltby and as an echo of the windows in William Stair Boultbee’s 20th century painting and Ryan's 21st century work. This final painting then spans the full range of my ancestral artistic journey.

[1] https://www.youngcreativeawards.org/masterclasses/me-home-art-ryan-boultbee-artists-activity-pack/

Relationship: I am Ryan’s eighth cousin, twice removed.