Interview by Jimon

1. Where did you grow up, and where do you live currently?  I grew up in Southern Ontario and Florida. Now I live in Toronto. It’s sort of the New York of Canada and almost just as expensive.
2. How would you describe Troy Brooks?  I’m a painter of women. Drawing and painting are really the first things I can remember and pretty much everything I do is in service to my work.

Did you have any official training for art?  I’ve had no training. For better or worse I have taught myself the delicacies of oil paint. My mother tried to get me to take art courses but it never really worked out. I was only interested in independent trial and error.

1. How long have you been making art and what lead you to start?  My mother was painting in water-colors as a hobby when I was born and she let me draw beside her. We used to make pictures together in the afternoon while an old Bette Davis movie was playing. I used to ask her to draw Wonder Woman for me and I’d laugh uncontrollably like I was being tickled.
2. Is there any reality behind the characters in your art or is it pure imagination?  I’m not sure what you mean by that. The women are mostly made up, but the narrative they are acting out usually mirrors some sort of disturbance or happiness that’s floating around me. Anything you paint is some sort of reflection of your reality or at least how your perceive it.
3. The future is _________.   At the moment I think the future will be complete decimation. I know that seems bleak but as far as I can tell there are too many knuckle draggers obsessing over money for us to evolve past the corner we’ve painted ourselves in. So have that dirty martini now.
4. What advice would you give putative collectors?  My advice would be to never ask for advice where art is concerned. If it doesn’t speak to you on a gut level then I say you should pass unless you are looking for an investment. I feel art should be about magnetism and intuition. If you like intellectual art then have at it. Personally if something doesn’t communicate to me below the level of language I’m not interested.
5. How did you acquire your style? My style was an accident because my faces always come out too long. One day I decided to stop fixing my bad proportion and I started accentuating it.
6. Have you ever come across a piece of art that you could not or did not want to stop looking at? There’s a painting the Art Gallery of Ontario has in their collection but they’ve had it in storage for years or maybe they’ve given it to another gallery. I’m not sure but it’s a painting that I probably love more than any other painting I’ve see. It’s a 1921 piece by Kees van Dongen of a prostitute standing naked. I’m not sure what I love about this painting but it’s got such atmosphere and character.
7. What influences you as an artist?  Light and shadow. My biggest most immediate, hard influences have been old films. I could be a film historian. I grew up collecting old film books and I drew all the photographs and read all the text about the directors and the photographers and of course the stars. The old films from the 20’s all the way up to the 60’s will probably always be a part of my palette.
8. What kinds of art hang on the walls of your home?  The walls of my home are covered in empty frames. I used to buy antique frames to refurnish and I had no place to put them so I figured I should put them on the walls to get them off the floor. Every inch of wall space has a frame on it. I’m sure it’s a bit chaotic looking when people walk in.
9. How do you describe success as an artist?  Success as an artist is complete freedom. I don’t answer to anyone and I do what I like. That freedom is my most precious luxury and I cherish it.
10. Do you have a place/person/thing that you visit for inspiration?  I usually need a vacation from inspiration because it chases me 24/7. There is an old Tori Album called Boys For Pele that has been a geyser of inspiration to this day. I think there’s probably some DNA from that album in everything I’ve painted in the last 20 years.
11. Name three things you can’t live without in your studio?  A place to lie down because sometimes painting can be unbelievably taxing and I have to nap. Also I need to have my audiobooks to give my mind something to chew on during all those hours I spend painting fine detail work.
12. If you could have dinner with 3 artists living/dead who would be at your table?  Francis Bacon, mostly because he was one of the few artists who could talk articulately about his work. I think he’d probably laugh at my work and call it illustration but I think we’d get drunk together and have a good laugh. Andy Warhol, not because I liked his work because I don’t consider him responsible for any of it, but I liked the drag queens and characters he surrounded himself with. The 3rd one would be Klimt and Egon Schiele together. We’d make a good ménage á trois.
13. How would someone find you on social media?  Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/womenoftroy/  Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/officialtroybrooks/  Twitter – https://twitter.com/Mr_Troy_Brooks  Website – http://www.troybrooks.com/