Endless

Since graduating from our Fine Art degree, Endless has become a ground-breaking artist who combines street art with contemporary practices. As well as working with Karl Lagerfeld, Gilbert & George and more, he is the first ever street artist to have work accepted into the historic Uffizi collection and included in the official Venice Biennale.

What have you been doing since graduating from ARU?

I’ve been on a journey of discovering how to make it as a fine artist in the real world. That’s taken me through doing street art, getting recognised by galleries, museums, and showing my work around the world.

It’s a big challenge because you can be the best artist in the world, but if no-one sees your work, if the right people don’t see it, then no-one will know about you. It’s all about putting your work out there.

When I graduated I moved to London because I thought everything is in London - all the creative outlets. But then I went to galleries, and they won’t just take you on because of your work. I had to build up a way of people seeing my work through the internet, but also using street art.  I was putting my work on the streets of London for about four years.

I saw it as advertising my work - I would just put it on the wall. Eventually a gallery saw it and came to me, and I did my first gallery show in 2016. Then another gallery came to me, who took me to Italy, and then it just kind of snowballed after that.

But you never feel fully secure, even if from the outside it looks like you’re doing well. You maybe are, but there’s always lots of hurdles and things that can go wrong.

Tell us about having your work accepted for the Uffizi collection

The director of the Uffizi Gallery Eike Schmidt saw my work and contacted me. He was looking to bring in new artwork. He created a portrait room for contemporary work. So that was quite a big thing, as the museum has all these pieces you learn about in history of art, the real ones. So when I think that my work’s in that collection - it’s strange. Surreal.

But I always look at the how and why of things. From the outsider’s point of view, you might think “Wow, that’s amazing.” But there’s always steps to how and why they happen, like the museum was looking to bring a younger crowd in.

But equally, my work is now in that collection, and no-one can take that away. It’s like a marking point - all the years I’ve worked not making money, not making connections. It’s nice to get to this point where I can say “Oh, it has worked.”

I was also lucky enough to be the first street artist to exhibit a large-scale installation at the Venice Biennale back in 2022 for San Marino.

This was another marking point in my career.

Were there ever times when you questioned why you were doing it, or did you always feel devoted to your art?

Through school, university, college - I always knew I was going to do art as a fine artist. Not working for someone else. But you always question it, every day. You question yourself: am I making the right stuff, or am I just pleasing someone? There’s so many questions. You have to learn to overcome them, and work forward.

You want to get your work known, but you don’t want to get pigeon-holed into doing just one thing. You want to have the freedom to do what you actually think you should be doing. If you make something that becomes popular, you could just spend your whole life making that one thing. But being an artist you’ve got loads of ideas and you want to get them out. Otherwise you’re just a machine with no passion and nothing new to say.

I want freedom. I might examine the same thing for five years, but if so I’ll be the one deciding that. I always let the work tell me what to do. I’ve got so many ideas and some of them won’t work, some of them will, but it’s all an experiment.

Why did you choose to study at ARU?

I left school at sixteen and I went to art college for three years. I was into screen printing and graphics, and the screen printing teacher recommended Cambridge School of Art as being one of the best for screen printing.

He said “You’ve got something here; you love doing it. Why don’t you go and see these people?” So it was really casual at first. I went for an interview, and they seemed to like me. They look through your body of work, but they’re interested in how you’re thinking as well. They don’t want to see you as a fully-formed artist. They want to see that you’ve got a passion for it, or a need to do it.

Even though I was in fine art screen printing, if I had an idea I could go to the sculpture department and use their stuff, or I could go to illustration and talk to that teacher. It wasn’t so rigid that you just had to stay in your department.

Did you always know that you would go to university and if not, what changed your mind?

I never thought of a structure at that age, that I would definitely go to university. It was only going from school to college that I realised university would be a good next step because I could carry on doing what I loved, and learn more.

There’s so many artists now on instagram or social media that didn’t study art, and studying is becoming a bad word for some people. University, particularly the money side of it, has become something that people are downing now. But even if you think you’re not learning at university, once you come out into the real world you can see there’s a structure that you’ve learned; how to process ideas.

And what they’re not saying is that you really need three or four years of just doing that one thing you believe in, without anyone outside saying “You need to make this”. It gives you time to think deeper. Time to learn how to make, and how to think.

What inspired you to get involved with fine art in the first place?

I remember when I was about 3 or 4, going to nursery and doing handprint paintings, where you put your hand in paint and just put it on paper. But I didn’t want to do that. I wanted to draw around it. I was crying, saying “I don’t want to do what everyone else is doing, I want to make this,” which was basically a stencil, drawing around my hand.

Then I look back at other stages through my life, and think, “Ah, that’s because I knew what I wanted to do creatively.” You have to have this stubbornness to see an idea through.

But when I think about what makes me do it - I don’t think you can ever say, because it’s just inside you. I think it’s inside everyone, the creative drive, but as you get older and into the real world, there’s so many things that tell you not to do it or you question itself. “This isn’t a proper job” or “I won’t make money from that”, and that can stop you doing it.

What’s the most valuable thing you took away from your education?

The first thing I took away was how to think as an artist, from when I was at college. Then I went to university and it was a little bit more focussed. We did philosophy of art, thinking about why you’re making something, and what it means. A deeper thinking.

The other side to it was the techniques. Cambridge School of Art had such good technology. The screen printing room was huge. You could learn how to physically make stuff with no boundaries, because everything was there that you needed.

In real life, you could never have all that. You’d have to pay a certain amount to go screen printing, then for the computers, and a computer teacher, and a sculpture room. It doesn’t exist in real life unless you’re a multi-millionaire and you’ve made it all.

Which aspects of the course most helped your career development, and why? 

You have a final exhibition, where you’re showing your work in a gallery situation. You have to plan what you put in the space, and why, and do some writing behind it, to give a story. So that was quite accurate to how it is in real life.

Our teachers were all artists too, so they were showing us their work as well, and talking about their professional lives. Having professional artists and lecturers in their fields really helped you see that there was an art world that was wide and diverse. You could ask them questions about their career and they would give you straight, truthful answers.

I’ve also used skills I learned at university when working on collaborations with brands such as Karl Lagerfeld, Fiorucci and more.

What advice would you give to other people thinking of studying fine art?

If you’re thinking about it already, you probably know you’re a creative person, and that’s where you want to go. There’s loads of hurdles money-wise, or even just taking three years out to do something. So you’re probably going to be quite serious about it already.

But I think you should go there first, go to the Open Day, see what the course is physically, the buildings and everything, to give you more of an idea. I can remember going to the Open Day at Cambridge School of Art and thinking that the buildings were amazing, the studios really good. Everything was modern. And then you meet the teachers, and they’re nice. You need to get a feel for it before you commit.

But going to university gives you time to discover who you are, and what your artwork is, and how you can take that into the real world, so it’s definitely a good idea.

I can’t say what I’d be without it but, looking back, I can see how it has affected how I work now, giving me structure, and even learning things like Photoshop or Illustrator, which I use every day. I use all the things that I learnt every day now.

What was your favourite thing about studying in Cambridge?  What have you learned about the city that you didn’t know before?

Obviously it has a massive reputation with Cambridge University, and that makes the whole city feel different. You feel that energy - you’re in a place of learning, with people actually doing good things in the world.

If you walk around you see all the historical buildings, and the town is so nice anyway, just picturesque. If you live somewhere like that you will always feel positive and good about what you’re doing.

When you’re studying you need that calm, to be in surroundings where other people are learning. You have deeper thinking to do - you don’t need to fight against things, you need to look inside and figure out what you’re doing.

You don’t want to be somewhere where there’s chaos - if you’re in London, the centre of London, it has it’s own vibration in its chaos. But if you’re somewhere nice you’ll feel good and learn more.

What projects can we look forward to seeing from you in the near future?

I’m working on new exhibitions. I’ve done new bodies of work that have taken four years to produce, and now I’m looking to exhibit them. So you can make the work, but then you have to do the business side of things, and figure out which galleries to show them in. There’s no guarantee where you’re going to show it, or if it’s going to sell. All these things are unknown.

I’ve done a few commissions, but I try to stay away from them because if you do too many, you’re just making things that other people want. You’re not making the work that you should be making. As an artist, you have to have a stupid amount of belief in what you’re doing, even if no-one else knows what it is.

People might think “This guy’s crazy. No-one’s asked for this.” But if you make it, and your work is worth a certain amount of money, and it’s in a certain museum, then they’ll say “You did really well.” But until that point you’re always fighting against everything!