When I was on apprentices, we used to get trade magazines. I'm making the tea one day and picking the post up for the men. A trade magazine come in and, while I was the kettle was boiling. I'm thumbing through it and there was an article on Pietrasanta in Carrara. And I thought, God, lots to go there.
Martin Foot:At the time, being green, you could say as I was, I thought, how can someone like me go to Italy? I mean, Italy was it had that glamour and, you know, film stars and the good life. I can't go to Italy, you know, and, the language and so on, you know. But then working in Australia with the Italians, and, I just thought sorry.
Sarah Monk:Hi. This is materially speaking, where artists tell their stories through the materials they choose. In this series, I'm talking with artists and artisans in a community in Northern Italy, around a town called Pietra Santa, near the Marble Mountains of Carrara. The area is known for its natural beauty with sea and pine forests on one side, and olive groves on hillsides which rise up into the Apuan Alps on the other. Pietro Santa has a long tradition of carving marble, and has been nicknamed Little Athens.
Sarah Monk:Today, we hear the story of Martin Foot, a Liverpudlian sculptor, carver, and restorer, who found his way here in a rather roundabout way. We met in his studios on the outskirts of Pietra Santa, a large industrial space with high windows from which the light streamed down. The high window sills were lined with marble busts of bearded men and portrait heads of children. His workbench was packed with measuring rulers, sanding blocks, hammers, and jam jars holding his enormous collection of chisels. On his shelves were numerous samples of architectural carvings, a large number of small classical statues, and circles like large coins with human faces and animals carved in low relief.
Martin Foot:My name's Martin Foot. I'm a sculptor, carver. I never consider myself as an artist, but I suppose some people do. I fall into a strange category because, I do a bit of everything, you know.
Sarah Monk:And where were you born and what did you how did you start?
Martin Foot:I was born in Liverpool, 1958 on the Dock Road. I used to work on, like, weekends and summer holidays for my uncle who had a stonemasonry business. So that was from about 13. I remember seeing, the men there working, with wooden mallets and making all these lovely things to go on buildings. I just thought, I'd like to do that.
Martin Foot:I was sold. So I ended up doing apprenticeship with him and worked on lots of public buildings, churches, and working on them, you know, sort of opens a whole new world. You know, the more you learn about something, the more you see. Being in Liverpool, like, there's lots of wonderful public buildings with ornament, sculpture on them, and curiosity sets in then, and you'd always wanna push the boundaries. I started off doing flat surfaces by hand, and then, you know, you wanna do mold, and then you wanna put ornaments on, and you wanna move on from there.
Martin Foot:At school, I passed my o level. I think I got a grade 1 a year before my time. After, I passed, asked the art master what, what he recommended, and his opinion was find a job where I could apply my skills to. He said most people who go to art school, they end up stacking shelves in supermarkets when they come out, or they can't get a job, they can't make money. He said, so if you find a job that pays and you can you use your creativity, probably the best advice I had.
Martin Foot:I took his advice, and, I thought, you know, this has got this type of work has got a bit of what I need. I also like the outdoors. I certainly was then a a workaholic. I'm cured now on Gladys' side. But it is addictive, this job, you know, and, I have got a hard work nature about me.
Martin Foot:I set my apprenticeship with him.
Sarah Monk:So who was him? Sorry. Yeah.
Martin Foot:My uncle.
Sarah Monk:Oh, your uncle.
Martin Foot:Yeah. Yeah. It was a difficult time. He wasn't an easy man. Coming up to 19, 20, 19, I think it was when I finished.
Martin Foot:I just wanted a taste of something else. And a week after my apprenticeship was finished, I left, much to a surprise. And, I went to Sydney, Australia with a a couple of mates. It was a cheap passage. I think it cost £65 at the time, long wait.
Martin Foot:Now I arrived in Sydney, with these two mates, and I got on the train and, into the city center. I got off at town hall. I saw the town hall all in sandstone and ornate building, full of scaffold, all scaffold around it. Oh, this looks interesting. Folks of some men there, they sent me to another site.
Martin Foot:The man there, the boss, he put me on the phone to the main boss, and, he was an English bloke called Al Turnbull. He said that you're the Scouse, aren't you? I said, yeah. He said, have you got your tools with you? I said, yeah.
Martin Foot:He said, when can you start?
Speaker 3:So what sort of work were you doing for him?
Martin Foot:It was they were all Italian workforce, and we were working there. At that time, 1977, they just plowed 1,000,000 into a big restoration project on all the public buildings. So there's lots of carving and, you know, capitals and gargoyles and all things like that. Young 19 year old leaving Liverpool, and, I think I was earning about 3 times as much money as I was in Liverpool. Great work, great opportunity.
Sarah Monk:And what's that risk ratio work? It's just I don't know. Is it done
Speaker 3:in situ or you have pieces that
Sarah Monk:you do in studios and then they get
Martin Foot:A a bit of both. I I used to work in Britain. I don't know if it's still like this now. I worked on Big Ben Houses of Parliament in the early eighties, and that was all done in situ. It was extremely cold working on the riverfront, carving gargoyles and the likes ornaments on the building.
Martin Foot:In Australia, I I went to a school of anatomy, the which I loved, and it sort of fired me up again to do more figurative work. And we studied anatomy, and the Stephen Wesley got was the, the art master, and he was excellent. I mean, that was a big turning point for me. I knew Diana wanted to move on a little bit, like, get into figurative sculpture. In 93, I started getting private commissions for portrait busts and again being more ambitious and wanting a bigger piece of the pie type of thing.
Martin Foot:I thought it's time to go to Italy. It's now or never. So when I landed there, that was there was no going back for me. It's just I thought I'd landed in heaven.
Sarah Monk:Why was that?
Martin Foot:At that time, 96, I first came here. Like even in the town center, there was workshops everywhere. You know, there's lots of old school sculptors and carvers. And I mean, I always say I got got here at the end of a golden age. There was a way of life about it.
Martin Foot:It was a Pietrasanta was like a dusty dusty provincial town. Plus then, you know, the place itself, you know, the beauty that surrounds it, the food, wine, the sea. So there was no way I was going back to England on the plate.
Sarah Monk:And what about the marble? Was that
Martin Foot:I mean, I was like a sponge then. I just wanted as much information as I could get my hands on. There wasn't enough housing that day you know, and if there never is. As much experience as I had there was still and I'd realized that before I left England, a lot more to learn. You know, I mean this is it.
Martin Foot:You're working in a town like Pietrasanta . It's small, compact, and there's competition in a big way. You know, and they've been working marble here for 100s of years, so they find ways that inventive extremely inventive the Italians and creative. Over 100 of years, they found the best ways to do it. And all that, is changed immensely today.
Martin Foot:Probably the first thing was the the American, market collapsed when the euro came in. Then you had the the build up of the Chinese market. And I think taste as well. You know, if you're maybe in 1980, 1990, someone who's made money in the 45 and the retired and didn't like some classical statues or busts in around the house, but I don't think that's the case anymore. And then on top of all that, you've got technology.
Martin Foot:If you've got an old artisan who's got his lean to workshop at the back of his house, and someone comes along and says, we'll give you 500,000 for it. But it's just a way of life. I mean, everything changes, and the at the end of the day, you've got to adapt to change. You know, I I've got a great belief in the youth. If a young person sees someone creating a classical figure in marble by hand, you know, I'm sure it's gonna have the same effect on them as it did, you know, 30, 50, 100 years ago.
Martin Foot:I had people in there yesterday, visiting, and they they were just blown away. They'd never seen anything like it. If you give young people the opportunity, I mean, they'll take it. We're responsible for them. I mean, I I have lots of people who come by and, you know, they need help and they'll work with me for a couple of months and, you know, I'm always happy to help them.
Martin Foot:I'm only sorry I've not got more time to give them. I mean, I I have the fear that God put into me when I was a young lad, you know, if I made a mess of that, what was gonna happen. And so the first thing I always say to someone who's working here, don't worry about make mistakes. I say, you cannot make a mistake. You know, what's a mistake?
Martin Foot:It's a mistake if you don't learn by an error.
Speaker 3:So can we talk a bit about
Sarah Monk:the work you're doing now? And other question is, what are your favorite marbles?
Martin Foot:I work an awful lot in statuary marble. I'm working on a project at the moment. I spent about 12 months on and off in my free time looking for the marble, because I had to make the clay model first. So while I'm working on the model, I'm looking for and I could never find anything. I mean, looking for marble is a minefield.
Martin Foot:I mean, the whole marble business, it's a, you know, you can have big setbacks. Even the most experienced marble carvers, you know, you can buy a block and it can look great on all sides, and then you cut into it. You've got a a a vein where you don't want 1 or a mark on the face or a defect. This project I'm working on now, just by chance, I came across a block while I was looking for something other than that. It's a Carrara marble, but it's, really as beautiful.
Martin Foot:And it makes a world of difference to the whole work process because they, you know, you sometimes you can get marble and it can be hard as how, you know, if you're working on it for 5 months or whatever it may be. It can just make it so much more difficult.
Sarah Monk:So what's special about this marble?
Martin Foot:What's special, it works really well first and foremost. It really works well. Really uniform in colour. There's no, impurities or veins.
Sarah Monk:So can you describe this piece, since this is an oral project, and also tell us the process. So you start with a
Martin Foot:It's, an effigy. The process is I produced a clay model from the clay model. I never actually made the plaster cast. It was very complicated to do. So that here in Pietrasanta, one of the great things about being here is everything is on your doorstep and there's people specialized in all different aspects of the the work.
Martin Foot:Also, there's, like, shops, like corner shops that sell every tool and whatever material you wish. So at the the mold was made, the plaster cast was produced by a specialist. That is then the working model from which you produce the marble from. So all points of reference are taken from there.
Sarah Monk:And you do restoration work as well?
Martin Foot:Yep. I work in bronze marble. I really enjoy working in, producing terracotta. I think it's beautiful. It's very honest, I think, terracotta.
Martin Foot:Every touch is visible. Working in marble, it's very, it's slow. And as I say, there's lots of complications involved. It's heavy. You need a mountain of tools and equipment.
Martin Foot:Having said that, it's, it's what I love about it, the challenge.
Sarah Monk:And can I ask a bit about your studio?
Martin Foot:I've had a number of studios here in Pietrasasanta , and I hope that this is the last one. I'd say I've had 6 studios since I've been here. And every year that passes, you accumulate more tools and more plaster casts. And every year that passes, you get older. No.
Martin Foot:I'm sure. Yeah. And the the will to be humping all this stuff from studio to studio. God. The other last place was a beautiful studio in the middle of town, and it was very romantic at the earth floor and but it wasn't practical, really.
Martin Foot:And I knew, how to get out. When I took this place on, it was just a box basically. So I had to not only move everything, I have to build this and make it what it is now. But, there's a lot of hardware. I think it took me years to get over that.
Sarah Monk:So when did you move here?
Martin Foot:The beginning of 2016, February.
Sarah Monk:And I love the way you've painted, the walls are kind of a blue, so your piece is it's a little bit like a Wedgwood, if I may say
Martin Foot:so, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Martin Foot:Now, I really like it here. I like this I like the view in front of the hills and the mountains outside, the pine trees and everything. It's and it's very practical.
Sarah Monk:There's less complaints about noise.
Martin Foot:No one no one complaints.
Sarah Monk:Are you allowed to work any hours?
Martin Foot:Any hour. Any hour. It's not it it isn't really a good thing because I said I need someone to tell me to
Sarah Monk:to stop work. Can you chat about the sort of things you've done, that you're proud of? I'm sure you're proud of all your work, but you know what I mean?
Martin Foot:Well, not all of it. No. Like, I mean, whether you're a musician, a writer, or whatever, you know, you look at your past work and, you know, sometimes you cringe and sometimes you think, oh, you know, could have done this a bit better. Or a conservation center, wonderful place in Liverpool. Actually, it was, that would have been 96, 1996.
Martin Foot:And I reproduced a marble statue on top of the art gallery. This huge thing about 2 and a half meters high. It was prepared in China for economical reasons. I think it was a 41 ton block, and I worked on it for about, 6 months, I think. Unfortunately, I never ever got any recognition for that, which I am sort of get used to that actually for it was a political thing I was told because they didn't wanna upset the people from China.
Martin Foot:So the upset means that's Some people, strive for recognition and success, which is what is success. I learned from that experience with the, spirit of Liverpool, it's called the piece of sculpture. So I was really disappointed at the time, felt shortchanged. I thought in hindsight though, it's a waste of energy, wanting that. It wasn't just for me.
Martin Foot:It was people who were close to me, who I wanted them to be happy. It wasn't so much a personal thing for me. I mean, you've gotta let those things go. Eat your life. You know, people strive for recognition and, I mean, at the end of the day, breathing in and out's a big deal.
Martin Foot:You know what I mean?
Sarah Monk:So, maybe your own creative work? How does that fit in?
Martin Foot:I used to have a lot more time between work. I built up, I don't know, maybe 7 or 8 pieces just before I moved here. I did an exhibition in Hong Kong and things went well. Since then, I have to say I've I've probably been too busy to do any of my own work. In actual fact, there's a piece over there on the plastic that I started last August.
Martin Foot:I've been wetting it down and wetting it down, and I just never get time to do it.
Sarah Monk:And technology, that's the last thing. I think I was gonna ask you is, or how has your working practice changed in the last so you came here 20
Martin Foot:2 years ago. Yeah. I've used technology very, very little. I work, and have done since 98, I think, with a company in London who restore chimney pieces, period chimney pieces. And, I used to do everything by hand, and then I started getting them roughed out by a machine and take it on from there.
Martin Foot:But even that was very limited. That was about the extent of me and technology. If the great sculptors of the past were alive today, I'm sure they would use it. But I I think having said that, I think they would use it in a more intelligent way. I'm not siring everyone with the same brush.
Martin Foot:Too many people say too many shortcuts with technology. You still have to finish a piece when it comes off a robot, but the quality of the finishing is slipping away as well. Working in restoration and so on, the valuable thing that it has, you're looking on as original pieces. So you're seeing the level that you have to achieve. If you're not aware of it and you you're not studying it, you'll never get there.
Martin Foot:You've got to know where how high the bar is. A lot of people compare their work with the man or woman next to them. I would say, you know, if you wanna know how good you are, go into one of the beautiful art galleries and look at that work.
Sarah Monk:So thanks to Martin Foot. You can see his work on his website, martinfootdot com, and follow him on Instagram, @martin.footdotsculptor. For photographs of all the work discussed today, you can also
Sarah Monk:follow our Instagram, or visit our website, materially speaking.com. And do join the mailing list to hear more about upcoming shows.