Liam Spencer
Artist, Rossendale

Artist in studio (Rossendale); ‘Outside the studio’ painting (Inset); Artist studio, detail; Liam fishing on the River Calder; Liam’s garden football pitch.

It’s that kind of nice surprise that this wildlife haven exists

Born and raised in Burnley, Liam Spencer now works from his studio in the Rossendale Valley. Best known for his portrayals of the urban landscape, his work characteristically takes an everyday scene and makes it beautiful with his interpretation of light and colour. A proud Lancastrian, many of Liam’s paintings are of Northern towns and cities.

You’ve got your work and you’ve got your recreation and it’s very easy to take advantage of both here, whether that’s walking in the hills, mountain biking, fishing or whatever floats your boat, there’s plenty to do.

I started fishing really young. I used to go out with my brother and my mates, whether it was catching fish with your hands in a stream or fishing in the canals and mill lodges. There are wonderful places in the Trough of Bowland and the Ribble Valley but where I go is really close to Burnley. It’s a river that twenty years ago would just have been dead and polluted and now it’s a haven for wildlife and fish.

I suppose it’s a bit like the subject matter of my painting. I like finding beautiful things in unexpected places. It’s that kind of nice surprise that this wildlife haven exists, you can see Burnley on the horizon but you’re in this lovely river valley with all the wildlife that goes with it.

I’ve never really painted the wide-open landscape. I do really enjoy being in that landscape but it’s just that it’s not necessarily reflected in my paintings. I like ordinary subjects really. It’s often to do with light and that can happen anywhere. There are some industrial buildings on the way up to our house and I’ve done some paintings of them. In a way, I’m more likely to paint that than to go up to the hilltops and paint a stunning landscape. I guess it’s to do with ideas of picturesque but I don’t have to force it, it’s just there.

I suppose I always work from what I know. I have had projects in other places, New York and Istanbul for example, but the mainstay of my work is always the places that are on my doorstep. For a long time, that was Manchester but now it’s a combination of Manchester and Pennine Lancashire. From my point of view, it’s important to work with what you understand. Having grown up in Burnley and then moved away, I can appreciate it that much more now I’ve come back. You discover what was great about the place; you see it with different eyes.

The first exhibition of any significance I had was at Townley Hall in Burnley. In fact, that was probably the first place I was ever exposed to paintings… it was free to get in, or you used to go in to get out of the rain, but being exposed to a bit of culture is really important. The exhibition went to Blackburn and Accrington and, although that sounds parochial, it was the first one I’d had in a public space and it attracted press attention, it was quite a big thing really.

There are a lot of artists within a couple of miles radius of us and it’s nice to have that kind of activity around here. After all, Manchester’s still very accessible. That’s important for me because there are galleries I work with in the city and my wife still works there. You feel like you can pinch a bit of both worlds here, you’re surrounded by stunning landscape but you’re still easily connected to the city.

I still play football. Burnley’s a real football town. I spent my childhood either kicking a football around or messing about in the fields and rivers. Playing football and watching football, it’s just something that I’ve always done. I support Burnley… it’s kind of mandatory. I sometimes say it’s on your birth certificate, stamped ‘Burnley fan’. In all honesty, one of my favourite places at the moment is just above our house. We’ve got this field and this bumpy football pitch and we go up there and kick a ball around with my two kids. It’s just a really great view up there, you can see hills all around you and it’s just a lovely spot, it’s genuinely somewhere I really enjoy being.

It’s pretty windswept up there but it’s that kind of landscape though; it’s not California that’s for sure! A few weeks ago we got that first sunny day for ages and that feeling of spring is genuinely exhilarating. If it was sunny all year, we’d miss out on that pleasure.

Liam Spencer
www.liamspencer.co.uk