Street Art: Giving Marginalised Individuals an Outlet for Creative Expression
Every week in The Big Issue, our Street Art page gives talented, marginalised individuals an outlet for creative expression, as well as a platform to sell their prints through The Big Issue Shop.
Paul Gorman is 51 and has been living in his own flat for almost a year now following a long period of homelessness. He did this acrylic on canvas painting titled, View of Building, at an art class run by Loaves and Fishes, a charity helping homeless and vulnerable people in Salford and Manchester. “It started from looking at a German print,” he explains, “then I added my own background and colour.”
Jeremy Deller – conceptual, video and installation artist and Turner Prize Winner – on View of Building by Paul Gorman:
“I really like this. I can totally understand it. This kind of work is the kind of work I would make if I were painting – something like a fantasy almost of a building, almost like he’s a frustrated architect. I like the simplicity of it, there’s a lot of charm about it. It’s quite heartfelt as well. Work like that is something I can really enjoy. Art is a way of escaping a certain reality, possibly, and you can see that here especially in the subject matter, which is about where you live, it’s a home. It makes it more poignant. You can see he really enjoyed making it.”