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Three years ago, the papercut supremo Rob Ryan opened up a shop, Ryantown in Columbia Rd that sold his designs exclusively. With its white interior and brightly coloured wares covered in his signature graphics, it has a comparable feel to Keith Haring’s Pop Shop on Lafayette St in Greenwich Village. And just as Haring’s style incarnated the vibrant life of New York’s East Village in the nineteen eighties, Rob Ryan has created a visual language that is the most widely recognised expression of the explosion of creativity and new life which has taken place in the East End in the past ten years.

Yet Rob Ryan came to the East End many years earlier. He was one of the artists who benefited from the cheap studio spaces that were available in the Spitalfields Market after the fruit & vegetable market left. For years he worked there, making paintings like those shown here, before he reinvented the venerable art of the papercut in such superlative fashion – and in doing so found for himself the perfect marriage of artist and medium.

I was always curious to see what kind of paintings Rob Ryan did before the papercuts came along and made him famous. So I twisted his arm to bring out some of these old pictures which I publish for you here today. And I took this opportunity to ask Rob a little about the early years in Spitalfields, when he fuelled up with a full cooked lunch at the Market Cafe in Fournier St before each day’s work at his studio in the market.

“I got laid off from my job in 1991 – I was working for a typesetter and I was working from home – and at the same time I was made homeless with a two year old child. While we were on the list for a council flat, we were sent off to Wood Green for nine months. It was a state of limbo and I thought, ‘I’m not going to do any of my own art work until we get a flat.’ Once I moved into my first council flat, in Westminster in 1992, somebody said they had a desk available in a studio with four other illustrators above Barbarella Shoes in Shoreditch High St. And I was there a couple of years before I heard about Spitalfields Arts Projects – they were opening up artists’ studios on the old market. I moved into one of the smallest studios there, on the first floor, and there was a shop on Brushfield St where I could display my work.

My work was very much as it is now, except in ink and paint. I realised that a lot of people after leaving art school – as I had done – took jobs to pay for their studios and then it was too much for them to get there. So I got a job in a cinema in the evenings and at the weekends. I worked twenty hours a week, enough to keep myself going, and I went in to my studio from Monday to Friday. Lorna, my wife, has always supported me in my work, she worked as a teacher. I used to take the kids to school, and then I’d get on my bike and cycle over to the East End and work until three, and then I’d pick up the kids from school, and take them home and give them tea before I’d go to work at five thirty at the cinema, and then I’d come back at the end of the evening.

It sounds like a struggle, but I had such a good time and it all seemed normal at the time. I was always planning shows and working towards shows. I was always busy. I wasn’t working in a commercial way at all. We used to have exhibitions and we only thought to invite the people we knew. Few people found out and nobody ever turned up. But because I had no-one telling me what to do for ten years, maybe it allowed me to build up some level of confidence. I’ve always believed in myself, even before college, I knew that this what I wanted to devote my life to.

I wasn’t working in papercuts at all at that time – that work fell into place a bit later. What set me free was screen-printing. My mind spins around in lots of different directions. Everything changed when I moved to Bethnal Green and set up a screen-printing studio, and then I started doing printing for others and I would just make enough money that I could give up my weekend job. I got asked to do posters and magazine covers. I was really inspired by being busy doing stuff for other people. The level of energy was heightened, and then the papercutting thing came in about eight years ago, in 2003…”

The deceptive simplicity of Rob Ryan’s style is the outcome of  years developing his distinctive visual poetic language. And, like William Morris who also took inspiration from traditional techniques to create designs for a wide audience, Rob Ryan has found a way to reinvent papercutting that has true popular appeal, reaching its apotheosis now in books, prints, cards, mugs, teapots, bottles, plates, vases, t-shirts, watering cans, raincoats, umbrellas, moneyboxes,  scarves, badges, tiles, tapestries and tapes – all emblazoned with his instantly recognisable designs.

Ten years ago, when Rob was making the pictures you see here, no-one could have predicted the direction his work would take or the outcome that would result. His unlikely success is an inspiration to all the thousands of young artists in East London, the heroic result of following a personal intuition. As he told me plainly, “I didn’t feel any different then, I didn’t feel any better than anyone else. I always look as it as, this is the only work I can do.”

In 1992, Rob Ryan’s first East End studio was a desk above Barbarella Shoes on Shoreditch High St – on the extreme left of the left hand crescent-shaped window.

From 1995, Rob Ryan’s studio was the third and fourth windows from the right, at the West end of the Spitalfields Market – this picture shows James Mason walking past in 1967.

Paintings copyright © Rob Ryan

You can see Rob Ryan’s current work at www.misterrob.co.uk, follow his blog here and learn about Ryantown here.

You may also like to read
Rob Ryan, Papercut Artist
Rob Ryan at Somerset House
On the Papercut Express with Rob Ryan
Rob Ryan’s Tintinnabulation of Bells

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Already, months have passed since Spitalfields Life contributing photographer Sarah Ainslie and I enjoyed the first instalment of our crawl around all the Pie & Mash Shops in the East End, indulging ourselves recklessly in their irresistible mouth-watering hot meals. And so, with renewed appetite we set out again, led by an inescapable craving for a some good meaty pies and, I am relieved to report, we were not disappointed in our quest.

As before, we commenced in the East and worked our way across the territory, starting our journey at Maureen’s Cockney Food Bar in the lively Chrisp St Market – boasting over thirty years of pie making and recently voted as the East End’s number one hidden gem by users of the Docklands Light Railway. Since Maureen retired years ago, the credit goes to her son Jason who bakes the pies and his wife Karen who keeps everything running smoothly. Yet even Karen was a little flushed by current events, which had resulted in a stream of photographers and televisions crews over successive days, and Sandra’s Bullock’s sister – a food journalist and pastry chef – who came in a limousine to savour the pies at Maureen’s.

I was immediately endeared to this friendly and supremely unpretentious establishment that has triumphed on nothing less than the superlative quality of its pies. No wonder trucks arrive from Liverpool and Newcastle before dawn each morning to carry away fresh deliveries to the North of England, and pies are shipped internationally to Spain, Italy and South Africa where ex-patriot East Enders rely upon regular supplies from Maureen’s to ameliorate their homesickness.

The shop is shut on Monday because that is when Jason goes at three in the morning to buy his beef in person at Smithfield Market and then spends all day mincing it by hand. Only he and Maureen know the secret pastry recipe in use for over half century, Karen informed me, raising her eyebrows for effect. And if you are planning a party, be aware that they supply pies in bakers’ dozens – thirteen for the price of twelve – and you get free liquor (as the delicious parsley sauce is known) if you bring your own jug. Ideal for weddings, Karen emphasised. Maureen’s Cockney Food Bar is the East End’s next hot food destination, so you had better go before toffs from Islington find their way across to Milwall or Sandra Bullock’s sister returns with Sandra Bullock.

Over in Hoxton, F.Cooke was also alight with the glow of popular appreciation, including a recent visit from David Beckham. Yet Joseph Cooke (whose grandfather opened the other shop in Broadway Market in 1902 now run by his brother Bob) takes it in his stride in the way that only those who enjoy universal popularity can do so. “No additives or artificial flavourings, we only sell top quality gear,” he assured me with a swagger, “The most authentic meal in the East End – the most traditional meal you could have.” And he spread his arms in a happy flourish of satisfaction, accompanied by an angelic smile upon his blithe, round, baby face – before he let it all crumple, rolling his eyes in comic despair, lamenting, “It’s an awful lot of work.”

While the regular diners ate their pies contentedly in near silence, seated at marble tables within the airy space of this former Barclays Penny Bank, Joseph expounded to me enthusiastically about the varieties of parsley available at different times of the year and how this effects the nature of the liquor. “We’re using Spanish parsley at the moment,” he explained, delighting in its tangy flavour and the viscous sauce it makes once it has been minced up. “You splash it on your arm and it stays like paint!” he exclaimed in wonder. Over coming months, to complement the pies made here from a recipe unchanged in four generations of piemakers, there will be fresh liquor of – successively – English, French, Spanish, Italian and Turkish parsley.

Naturally, Joseph was curious to learn how his pies in Hoxton St compared to those of his brother Bob in Broadway Market, but since they both use the same recipe and I did not wish to become the catalyst for any unfortunate sibling conflict I chose my words with care. Let it be known that I found Joseph’s pies gratifyingly meaty with a sweet gravy that was tasty and rich, and I shall be coming back here again. It says something that the floor of the dining room is thoughtfully scattered with sawdust to absorb gravy splashes caused by over-enthusiastic pie eaters. “My old grandmother ate pies every day of her life and when she died at ninety-three, she still had all her own teeth,” added Joseph in afterthought, as further advocacy – if such were needed – of the health benefits of a diet of pie and mash.

Sarah & I managed to fit in one more Pie and Mash Shop just to make our day complete, S & R Kelly & Sons in the Bethnal Green Rd. This appealingly intimate little blue and white shop with room for just a handful of diners is lined with matchboarding and tiles, and has an interior of Japanese simplicity. Here we met Jill who has worked for proprietor Robert Kelly for fifteen years, serving behind the counter. She explained that out of all the Kelly’s Pie & Mash Shops this was the original, established over one hundred years ago. “Most people seem to like this one!” she agreed when I complimented her on the shop, “They all say it’s the best one. Even people that move away, the first thing they do when they get off the plane is come here and have pie and mash.” We were very sorry to have  missed Jill’s oldest regular customer, a venerable lady of a hundred and three who had died a few weeks earlier. “She had been Robert’s milk lady when he was at school and she loved eels, and he didn’t use to charge her,” admitted Jill in affectionate reminiscence.

Of all the various communal spaces in the East End – even more than pubs or churches – Pie & Mash Shops exist in the public consciousness as the most celebrated locations of emotional memory, and the explanation lies in the food. East Enders love their Pie & Mash, because by enjoying this glorious meal they can participate in the endless banquet which has been going on for generations, longer than anyone can remember, and which includes all their family, relatives and loved ones, both living and departed. The world has changed and the East End has transformed, but the Pie & Mash Shops are still here and the feast goes on.

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The joyous art of handbell ringing has survived because it was kept alive by the Whitechapel Bell Foundry. “For many years we were the only company in the world making handbells,” revealed Kathryn Hughes – joint-Master Bellfounder with Alan Hughes – as we sat together in the peaceful office of the ancient foundry while outside the traffic roared down the Whitechapel Rd . “Handbell ringing survived because of one person, Anne Hughes, my husband’s grandmother.” Kathryn continued, “She was a solo handbell ringer, and that’s how Alan’s grandfather Albert met her, he heard the sound of her playing handbells at a concert. And for a wedding present, he gave her a thirty-chime set of handbells.”

As a lover of bells and bellringing, I am always pleased to visit the famous Whitechapel Bell Foundry, the centre of the world of tintinnabulation, responsible not just for casting big bells like the Liberty Bell and Big Ben, but also fine handbells. And, continuing the work of Anne Hughes, Kathryn herself is also a handbell ringer. “I do ring, yes,” she admitted with professional reserve – being an authority on handbells and presiding with formidable expertise over the handbells side of the business. “In the nineteenth century, traditional handbell ringing was very popular in the North of England,” she informed me, adopting an elegiac tone, “most villages had teams of handbell ringers just as they had brass bands, but the First World War decimated the teams and the whole thing died the death after World War II.”

“Albert Hughes wanted to stop making them,” confided Kathryn, almost embarrassed to admit it now and raising her eyebrows in barely concealed disapproval, “but his wife said, ‘Over my dead body.’” Anne’s stubborn refusal to let the art die was vindicated by the revival in handbell ringing which occurred in the latter half of the twentieth century, and today the art is thriving again. Now, in an exciting development, to complement the wide range of traditional compositions that exist, the bell foundry is supporting three commissions of experimental pieces for handbells by young composers to be performed as part of the Spitalfields Festival in the charismatic surroundings of Dennis Severs’ House next week.

I stepped by to join a rehearsal in one of the modest panelled rooms upstairs at the foundry, where a handsome array of gleaming brass bells lay upon the table, arranged in order of size. Taking it in turns to work with the two handbell players, the three composers drifted in and out from the next room, so I took the opportunity to have chat with them there, while the chimes continued on the other side of the door. In recent months, all three visited the time capsule house in Folgate St and have created pieces inspired by its mysterious interior, and conceived to be performed in its distinctive sound spaces.

“I’ve never worked with handbells before,” Shiva Feshareki declared, her dark pupils shining with excitement, “it’s been an opportunity to think in a different way.” The composer known only as Gameshow Outpatient agreed, “We’ve all gone in completely separate ways, which I think is good.” he said. Yet, seduced by the beauty of the sound of the bells, these two have both created semi-improvised compositions that allow the bells to speak for themselves. “I am using just four handbells, and I want to draw people to become aware of the quality of silence that exists in the house.” explained Shiva, “There are some church bells in the distance that I hope they will hear during my performance.”

Gameshow Outpatient has written a piece to be played in the withdrawing room on the first floor entitled “Dead Reckoning,” referring to the early eighteenth century when sea captains were expected to retain Greenwich Mean Time internally through physical memory during their voyages. “I’ve got a headache from listening to the opening of it over and over,” he said, rolling his eyes in playfully self-deprecation,”but the next section sounds really beautiful by comparison – thank goodness for that!”

“It’s nice to have the opportunity to be more intimate, you can encourage detailed listening when people are up close.” Edmund Finnis told me. “A lot of my music is quite fast paced and energetic but this is more meditative,” he confessed. He has sampled handbells and manipulated their sound, to accompany the live performance and provide an additional dimension of resonance.“I’m using a lot of handbells and I like the idea that people don’t know what they’re going to get,” he announced with a wicked smile, adding, “I haven’t cluttered it with too many notes, it’s about the joy of sound.”

These three premieres are part of a jubilant evening’s event celebrating bells that also includes performances in the Charnel House, and in the Masonic Temple beneath the former Great Eastern Hotel, entitled “Song of the Bell” and curated by Spitalfields Music Associate Artist Mica Levi – destined to bring Spitalfields alive to the echoing tintinnabulation of bells next week.

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