From butchery to artistry

Mark Demsteader: giant of the art world

1 More Image(s) In Gallery

Martyn meets...Mark Demsteader, the local artist with a giant presence
SHAKING hands with Mark Demsteader was a surreal experience.

Here I was in the company of one of the country’s most celebrated artists — his signature figurative works sell for £30,000 all over the world — and his mitts were massive.

Huge. I mean big, seriously big.

And yet so soft and gentle at the same time. Rather like mine, which are tiny and frail in comparison, but I’ve been a typist for the past 48 years so I have an excuse.

This guy, who is celebrated in Japan, Brazil, Chile, South Africa — in fact, anywhere where art is truly appreciated — works in oils and pastels from his studio in the centre of Uppermill.

Yet I suspect no one has a clue they are in close proximity to one of the country’s hidden gems, one of Oldham’s little jewels.

Except Mark Demsteader is anything but little. Not physically, not figuratively. He is a big fella is every sense of those words.

I knew not what to expect when he strolled into the Java Bar in Uppermill’s High Street for our early morning assignation.

I had a copy of his latest catalogue — from a Panter and Hall exhibition at the gallery’s St James’s premises in London — as a reference point, but there were no self portraits. Just simply stunning works from his contemporary figurative collection of sensuously beautiful women.

He has just completed a glorious interpretation of Emma Watson after being approached by the female star of the Harry Potter films — she played Hermione by the way for those of you outside of the JK Rowling circle — and in the past has completed a portrait of supermodel Erin O’Connor.

“I do paint males as well”, he volunteered without too much conviction. And with this he leaned back and laughed, a throaty roar from a genuinely self-effacing giant of the art world who was born in Failsworth, lived his adult life in Werneth and from his new family home in Uppermill bestrides his chosen sphere.

Yet his lifestyle of today — he has just returned from opening his own show in Hong Kong — is so far removed from his early days working with his father Harold in the family butchery business, at the wholesale market in Manchester and a retail outlet in Propps Hall, as to be almost the stuff of fiction.

So where, I asked, did his creative side spring from?

Because, to a normal bloke like me, there is no obvious connection betwixt humping half a cow from a conveyor in the slaughterhouse in Briscoe Lane to the sheer, beautiful delicacy of his current career.

It’s as much a mystery to Mark as anyone, to be honest.

He has always doodled and drawn, even at primary school and through his formative years at Failsworth Secondary in Brierley Avenue.

Mark has early memories of a school trip to Paris, and a visit to the Louvre gallery, and being in awe of some of the works. “I remember going up to one hangings and trying to unpick the corner. I was trying to work out just how they did it. One of the French guards wasn’t at all impressed I can tell you.”

His father, who would rise in the early hours to open his stall at the meat market, indulged the young, impressionable Mark by allowing him to attend a foundation course in art at The Oldham College and he developed his skills at the Art School in the Union Street Lyceum before landing a job at Dannimac in Hollinwood.

“I had a few other jobs but I was always destined for the meat business, I suppose,” he said.

And so he would cycle to work at 3am, hump the sides of beef, drink mugs of tea after spooning away the floating mince, and cycle home exhausted.

Yet he always found time for his drawing.

When his father fell ill and the businesses closed, his partner Diane used her influence to help him land a job at Hulme Grammar as a technician in the art department. At least his heart was now working closer to his art.

By now Mark was establishing a large portfolio of portraits, many from the life classes he would devour in the evenings, and he eventually struck up the courage to tout his work at galleries in London.

“I put a selection of my works into a folder, set off and started knocking on doors. I wanted feedback more than anything and I didn’t really expect any of the gallery owners to pick up on my works.”

A good job really, because no one did, but the feedback was precious and helped develop his undoubted talent. He persevered.

After several trips to London, James Corless, owner of the Blackheath Gallery, took pity on the Oldhamer and offered to hang six of Mark’s pieces at a forthcoming show.

“I was hoping he might raise a couple of hundred quid for each. When he rang me after one morning of the exhibition to say all six had sold, for £3,000 each, well...

“He asked me if I had any more, and could I get them down to London?”

Mark’s next task was to rush out to the family VW Polo and measure up the back seat.

“I had to make sure I only framed up the portraits that would fit in the car,” he explained with a grin that split his cheery countenance. He laughs easily, smiles a lot and, I suspect, is still coming to terms with his celebrity.

For make no mistake, this son of Failsworth is a big noise in the world of high-class contemporary art.

One of his works hangs in the British Embassy in Chile and others have found their way to all corners of the globe.

He quit his job at Hulme Grammar and, with Diane’s blessing and financial support — “the galleries take a considerable amount in commissions and so all those sales weren’t exactly profit”-— painting and drawing became his full-time career.

He spends 90 per cent of his time at his Saddleworth studio — rented from Oldham Council — but has plans to convert a garage at his new home in Uppermill, assuming he can get planning permission, and the rest travelling to the opening of his exhibitions.

“I do enjoy the parties and the opening night and signing a few autographs,” he conceded, his only concession to his fame in nearly two hours in his company.

Mark Demsteader remains one of us. He is a family man — he and Diane have a son Max and daughter Melissa — and these days uses couriers to transport his works rather than loading up the family saloon.

His unique style has evolved over the past 14 years he has been a full-time professional artist. It’s a style that is beyond any words I could conjure to describe but, to my untrained eye, his works look stunning.

At any one time he can be working on six to 12 works. “I want my portraits to be fresh and each one unique which is why I work the way I do.”

He chuckles gently when I try to discuss his stature in the world of art and the riches he must have accrued, pointing out he has refused entreaties to allow his works into the lucrative world of limited edition prints. “That route isn’t for me.”

One route, though, is heading for Paris to study with the famous Norwegian figurative artist Odd Nerdrum. At 49, Mark is still learning his craft.

And Oldham is finally learning about him.




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