The David Hardy Interview
01/01/2005 . Source: Geoff Willmetts 

What can I say about David Hardy? I’ve reviewed two of his books of space art on the website, had extensive chats with him discussing everything from art technique to astronomy and barely scratched the surface regarding his other interest ranging from his love of motor-bikes to guitar jamming to his occasional chairmanship over the years of Birmingham’s SF group.

At the tender age of 68, Dave looks totally unstoppable with his work popping up all over the place when you least expect it. So settle back for a rather interesting chat.

SFCrowsnest: You've had a long and industrious career painting on both canvas and digitally. Do you have a preference for either medium or does it depend on time and the job?

David Hardy: I'd have to say that I enjoy both processes about equally. I especially like the fact that it's a pleasant change to daub real paint on a large canvas after working for some weeks or even months on a monitor (even though it's a 22") and vice versa.

There are some jobs, mainly illustration, where the digital method is a 'must'. I'm thinking for example about the times, in years gone by, when I had to paint Saturn's rings or the orbits in the Solar System, all perfect ellipses with no kinks and all lines of equal thickness. Photoshop makes this SO much easier!

SFC: What do you see as your starting point for a picture once you start a picture on a computer. I mean do you broadstroke background and/or foreground before getting down to details?

DH: I use a variety of methods, depending upon the job. Sometimes I do a sketch first, scan it and work over that. Sometimes I simply 'paint' directly in Photoshop, starting perhaps with a black window. And sometimes I reverse the process, by producing a 'rough' or visual on the Mac and then projecting this onto a canvas and drawing it down for an actual painting. (The old masters did similar things, using camera obscura and such.) I worked this way for my latest commission, a 70 x 50cm acrylic painting on canvas of Beagle 2 on Mars for Prof. Colin Pillinger (see http://www.hardyart.demon.co.uk/html/beagle.html).

For some types of landscape, starting with the one I produced for ‘Futures’, I create a 'terrain' first in Terragen, a 3D program in which one can 'build a world', entirely under the artist's control. But I do a lot of post-production work on these, in order to make the finished piece look 'like a Hardy'! (The comments of various reviewers, such as Ron Miller, suggest that I succeeded.)

SFC: Do you prefer to use a mouse, keyboard, light pen or combination when painting with computer?

DH: I use an optical mouse for everyday use, word processing, etc. I don't use a light pen, but I wouldn't be without my Wacom graphic tablet, which has a 'pen' that one uses just like a pen, brush, marker or airbrush, as required.

SFC: Were the pictures of your art studio in ‘Futures’ tidied up for the photo or are you naturally that tidy?

DH: Which pictures? Well, I suppose everyone tidies up a bit when a photo is taken, but I am naturally pretty tidy and organised -- it's the only way I can work really.

SFC: Is there anything you've wanted to paint on commission but haven't been asked to yet?

DH: There must be loads of things, but I can't think of anything specific at this moment!

SFC: This might be my imagination, but comparing your work in the Paper Tiger books over the years, I got the impression that your painting palate is getting lighter/brighter or is the computer allowing you to experiment more?

DH: I don't think it is really; I think my style and palette have remained pretty constant - given that I've changed from gouache to acrylics/oils, to digital.

SFC: I take it you take intense interest with all the close-up photographs NASA get of the nearby planets let along the Hubble Telescope. Do you think your paintings reflect favourably to the photographs or are there lessons to be learnt for future work?

DH: I think others are probably better qualified to judge, but I have to say that all the comments I have seen of work influenced by the HST and various probes have been favourable.

SFC: Looking through your and Patrick Moore's latest book, 'Futures: 50 Years in Space' published by AAPPS, how have you found the book has gone down? You had a couple months of intense promotion after all, as well as a spread in 'The Guardian' newspaper. Did everything go as planned or expected?

DH: I honestly don't know. I don't tend to worry too much about sales etc, at least until about a year has gone by. 'Futures’ was published in the UK in May 2004 and in the USA in October (by HarperCollins). I went over to Worldcon in Boston in September to promote it, but sadly the US publisher did slip up there and only one dealer had about a dozen copies - which went very quickly. However, I have yet to see a bad review - most, including mags like ‘New Scientist‘, have been excellent and it has been suggested by those with experience in the field that 'Futures’ is worthy of being nominated under 'Best Related Work' for the 2005 Hugo Awards. I couldn't possibly comment, except to mention that next year's Worldcon is in the UK (Glasgow)! But of course, for that to happen a lot of people would have to nominate 'Futures’ when the ballot papers come around in December...

SFC: Of all the pictures for this book, did you start off with the Solar System or did you start with whichever picture information was ready to go first?

DH: I started out by selecting the images I thought should be used from 1954 (some previously unpublished) and the 1972 and 1978 versions of ‘Challenge Of The Stars’ (the sub-sub-title) and, where necessary, scanning them. The I decided which other existing paintings might be used, such as the extrasolar planets (exoplanets), I produced for PPARC and the ROE which had never appeared in book form before, although they were used in newspapers and on TV world-wide at the time of their discovery. Then I listed what completely new paintings would be needed, researched the necessary data and references and started producing those, more or less in the order they appear in the book.

SFC: In some respects, your paintings of the Solar System seem to lack the emotional impact compared to those of a galactic scale. Would I be right in saying the stars and other interstellar revelations have a greater attraction to you?

DH: To a certain extent, I suppose. The extrasolar stuff does tend to be more exotic and dramatic (black holes, pulsars, jetting and colliding galaxies...). But I don't totally agree with your premise!

SFC: Let’s put you on the spot about knowledge you’ve gleaned from co-writing 'Futures’ with Patrick Moore.

How much ice would have to be found on the Moon to make it viable as a colony?

DH: I can tell you without consulting him that Patrick is very sceptical about the likelihood of appreciable amounts of water/ice being found on the Moon. Personally, I think that enough comets should have impacted in the cold polar regions to make it viable. But I couldn't quantify that (I'm sure others can).

SFC: Finding ice in Mars' crust is a little less problematic. What's always puzzled me is how astronomers think that an asteroid can hit Mars and send a chunk of it towards Earth. I'd have thought the odds of getting everything in place for that to happen would be...er...shall we say, astronomical?

DH: Well, astronomical is right, and there are astronomical times as well as distance to be considered. The stuff wasn't just ejected straight towards Earth; it went into space at high speed, joined the other debris floating around in orbit and, eventually, maybe millions or even billions of years later, was attracted by Earth's gravity, survived entry through our atmosphere, and made it to the ground (usually found in the Arctic or Antarctic regions, where dark rocks stand out like, well, sore thumbs).

SFC: In the distant past before the Sun made Venus too hot, would it have been possible to have supported life, no matter how primitive?

DH: Maybe. There are some scientists who believe there could be life there now -- see my caption on page 33. But generally, there wouldn't have been enough time for more than micro-organisms to have existed.

SFC: I noticed the most significant changes was in the way you coloured the atmospheres. Obviously, the first televised Mars landings indicated this had to be a stronger consideration. These things are complicated so would be interested in getting you both to explain how variations in air pressure, temperature and density help or hinder the calculations. I mean, just because there is a methane atmosphere would there be any other gases present that might affect colour considerations?

DH: This is pretty complicated and it has to be said that a certain amount of artist's licence is often used! Mars is fairly straightforward; from dark blue the sky is now known to be salmon or peach-coloured due to suspended dust (stirred up by regular dust-storms), but near the Sun it is often bluish, so the red sunsets and sunrises that we know on Earth tend to be reversed. Venus will be generally pretty dark, with little actual sunlight penetrating the thick clouds, but the presence of sulphur compounds would give an overall yellow cast to the illumination. As for Titan, hopefully, we shall soon know for certain when Huygens lands at Christmas (released from Cassini). Ralph Lorenz suggests that the atmosphere itself would appear greenish due to methane; I believe I was the first to depict it in that colour, in the original ‘Challenge Of The Stars’, which I did after consulting with scientists at Birmingham University. However, there is so much 'smog' and cloud that these will surely impart an overall red/orange appearance.

SFC: What I always tend to find a little confusing that in an expanding universe how can the Milky Way and the Andromeda galaxy be on a collision course if they are spreading apart at the same time? Can you elaborate on this please?

DH: The universe as a whole is expanding, like spots painted on a balloon that's being inflated, but all bodies have 'real' motions too, in that they are moving towards or away from each other on a relatively 'local' scale. That's what's happening to the Milky Way and M31, as in my illo in 'Futures’.

SFC: No doubt, we've probably lost some people on the above questions, so let's bring Dave back into the picture. Do you have any advice for aspiring artists?

DH: If you enjoy SF and paint, do it. If you're good enough, send your work to publishers (on CD etc. if you wish, but don't expect them to look up your website). But it's a shrinking market, as too many publishers currently think they can 'do it themselves', on the cheap, by using Photoshop, Bryce, stock photos, etc :-( The same goes for space art, but in this case you need to be sure you know a fair bit about astronomy -- plus some geology, meteorology, chemistry, physics...it isn't enough to paint a couple of planets in a green sky.

SFC: You obviously prefer space painting over fantasy/SF art but do you ever see any of the latter problematic with what you know about space and technology?

DH: Personally I never paint anything in a SF picture that is scientifically impossible or inaccurate astronomically. I don't feel that this limits me at all, as the universe is amazing enough without resorting to 'pure imagination'! It does irk me when I see SF work (or even so-called space art sometimes, like that released by ESA showing Huygens on Titan, with Saturn clearly visible in the sky, huge and with its rings wide open) that is inaccurate. I mean, if you paint a horse, it has to look like a horse; who doesn't this apply to astronomical objects? Showing planets or moons with a 'dark side' against a light sky which is atmosphere is another one that always gets me. T'ain't possible!

SFC: In the past, you've been considered a Rolf Harris lookalike. Is this why you shaved your beard?

DH: I assume you're talking about ‘Hardyware’ now (published by Paper Tiger).

No, my beards and moustaches have always come and gone over a period of years. I look in the mirror and think, Boring - let's have a change!’ I've always enjoyed meeting Rolf, though, the last time being in 2001. He's a great chap and a damn good artist, in my humble opinion.

SFC: You have a passion for motorbikes. Can you elaborate on this passion and what was your favourite bike?

DH: At age 16 or so, I used to visit a friend on the other side of Birmingham to use his 6 inch reflector telescope and had to travel by bus - very long-winded and uncomfortable. Then one day a chap who lives near me was there on his bike and gave me a lift back on his pillion. I was hooked! In the RAF (1954-56 for National Service) I used to go into the local villages on the back of another friend’s bike and after demob plagued my mum to lend me £100 so that I could buy one. It was a Francis Barnett 150. My favourite was a Triumph 21, 350cc twin, on which I travelled to Austria, among other places. But my most recent was a Kawasaki W650, which was so much like the Bonneville I coveted but never had in the 60s that I just had to re-live my youth!

SFC: You also have a passion for guitars and jamming with famous musicians. Another passion that you might care to elaborate on. Is there anyone you haven't jammed with?

DH: That's not strictly true. I love rock music and other types. Had Buddy Holly lived, he would have been the same age as me and I guess he's still my 'hero'. And I have a Japanese Fender Stratocaster. But really I'm just a frustrated rock guitarist -- it's what I wish I could have done, but was never able to. What I do seem to have is a talent for meeting famous guitarists, which started with 'Big' Jim Sullivan in 1968 and included Brian Jones (who bought two paintings just before his death). Hank Marvin, Justin Hayward (Moody Blues), and most recently, Brian May (who wrote a lovely jacket blurb for 'Futures’).

SFC: Of your world travels, what have you seen as the most awe-inspiring?

DH: If I had to pick one, it would be the total solar eclipse I saw in 1994 (where I met Brian May - 'see Hardyware') at 14,000 feet up on the Altiplano - the Atacama Desert between Chile and Bolivia, where the sky was really dark and we were surrounded by seven volcanoes, some of them emitting plumes of steam during the eclipse. How much more alien can you get on Planet Earth?

SFC: The same applies to your off-world research. Is there anything out there that you'd like rather closer first-hand experience for inspiration?

DH: Oh yes, in theory at least. I'd love to go to see Mars at first-hand and Jupiter's moon Io and Europa and.....

But most of those are so hostile that it's possible humans may never go there. Again, I'm sure that Patrick will agree. Just to go into Earth-orbit would be good and at least that will be possible before too long; but not in my lifetime probably, certainly at a price that I could afford :-(

SFC: With all these interests, I assume you get some time to read occasionally. Any favourite authors?

DH: Naturally, the answer would once have been Clarke and Asimov (both of whom I've met, Arthur much more often and he also wrote a nice blurb for 'Futures’). Nowadays, I'd have to include authors like Stephen Baxter (see Foreword for ‘Hardyware’), Gregory Benford, Charles Sheffield, Ben Bova, Alastair Reynolds, Greg Bear - the list goes on.

SFC: You're a regular convention guest, care to tell us any pet peeves that fans can learn to avoid?

DH: Not really. The main thing, at a first convention, is not to let yourself be put off by the fact that fans tend to form groups and appear 'cliquey'. Don't hide in a corner; listen in to conversations, speak up if you think you've got something to contribute, buy a drink for someone who interests you - and that includes authors, who are usually very accessible and pleased to talk once you meet them! And don't miss the Art Show.

SFC: Many thanks to you for this interview.

Geoff Willmetts

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