Eljay Dickens is a people-person. She watches them, studies them, draws and paints them, and generally radiates a sphere of energy which attracts people to her. She says that colour is paramount to any painting she creates but detail is also there, the kind of detail to which one is not usually drawn so that everyday objects catch her interest; dustbins for instance or the expression of a stall holder in the market; bored to the back teeth sitting on a hard stool next to her wares but struggling to maintain an iota of interest in case a possible customer stops to look.
Her 100 year plus old stone house, near Yalikavak on the Bodrum peninsula, is a dream setting for budding and experienced artists, and over the past 18 years, it has been a backdrop to scattered easels, the smell of turpentine and furrowed brows as Eljay’s artist friends, who vie with each other every year to secure a bed for a few days with Eljay as host, enjoy the benefits of a full day working in the open air with no need to worry about a drop in temperature or a summer downpour.
Eljay ‘s background is art school, then animation. She has always been a graphic designer but took to comedic film making like a duck to water and her humour comes through in her paintings. She says that her biggest challenge is that there is so much to do and so little time and when asked whether the process is more important than the end result, she is not sure there is ever a final result – she still looks at work she thought finished but can find something to change or fix. She is currently working on a series called “I used to love you” – Reworking old cast-off paintings.
When asked about her artistic influences, Van Gogh, Matisse, Degas, Van Eyk, come up as does the importance of visiting galleries; finding new artists and re-examining familiar ones. As a group, Bodrum Art Collective takes every opportunity to drive out to sit in Eljay’s garden, to chat and drink coffee, laugh and swap ideas and we come away with our creative levels lifted despite feeling slightly shamed that our productivity levels are barely a tenth of our host’s. She is truly prolific and is an inspiration. In July 2019 Eljay was diagnosed with an inoperable Grade 4 brain tumour. After a year of treatment her doctors have shut the tumour down and in Eljay’s own word’s "All I know is that making art has knocked the fear of my tumour out of me. Maybe my new friend is helping me! I need a bigger studio space."
And to prove a point, since we last sat around her table (less that two months ago) we hear she is moving on to lino cuts.
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