Left: John Creed in his workshop. Right: Gates to the Usher Gallery, Lincoln. Forged steel, stainless steel and gold leaf. Photo: Left: Alastair Devine. Right: Chris Goddard.
Interview: John Creed
Sculptor John Creed talks to Jonathan Doering about his work and Quakerism
The artistic metalworker and sculptor John Creed has enjoyed a varied career in industry, education and the creative arts spanning more than five decades. An instinctive artist, his work seems to emerge from the hinterland between conceptual and practical, aesthetic and utilitarian, making his work particularly striking and tangible. Much of it is explicitly public art, more at home on the pavement than in galleries, but it is also consciously about public service: he is more likely to be working on items that serve some actual purpose – coat stands, signs, gates or musical instruments – than purely aesthetic objects offered as ends in themselves. He studied at Liverpool College of Art before working initially as a silversmith, later moving into teaching, ultimately at the Glasgow School of Art.
