Many know the acclaimed, painstakingly crafted films of Australian artist, writer and director, Adam Elliot. In 2004, he won an Oscar for his short film, Harvie Krumpet. His debut feature, Mary and Max (2009), voiced by Philip Seymour Hoffman and Toni Collette among others, was praised globally.
Yet, few have seen Elliot’s personal trove of drawings and clay sculptures.
That body of work is the focus of All the Lonely People, Elliot’s upcoming exhibition at Beinart Gallery in the inner north Melbourne suburb of Brunswick, his first-ever solo art show.
Curated with Gallery owner, Jon Beinart, the collection comprises decades of Elliot’s work. Much like his beloved films, Elliot’s debut art exhibition is tinged with sadness, and filled with eccentric characters and charismatic facial features.
“I’ve always been fascinated by what is it that makes somebody unique?” Elliot tells ArtsHub. “Their visual traits, their visual quirks. I am interested in idiosyncrasies. I love melancholy. A lot of my characters and drawings are melancholic, and I certainly emphasise saddened eyes.”
The name of the exhibition, All the Lonely People, reflects Elliot’s career-long interest in downtrodden, overlooked and misunderstood characters, who are often neurodiverse, or simply perceived as unusual.
“All my films deal with people with supposed disabilities. I don’t use the word ‘disabilities’ because really that’s up to the individual, but people with so-called ‘flaws’ or afflictions. All my films and my drawings are about celebrating and embracing our flaws,” Elliot says.
“I do target in on those aspects”, he adds. “I’m not interested in beauty. I have trouble actually drawing beautiful characters. There are characters I’ve drawn who’ve got lumps all over their head, or freckles everywhere, something that we [often] in society would consider an imperfection.
“But I [think], ‘no, it’s not an imperfection. It’s quite beautiful. [For me] it’s, ‘no, let’s celebrate their big ears or their big noses’. It’s subtle and subconscious in many ways, but I’m mirroring my own imperfections, my flabbiness, my baldness, my pale, lumpy skin.”
For Elliot, who grew up on a prawn farm in the outback and whose father was a retired acrobat, being creative has been a huge part of his life since childhood. He says it helped him make sense of the world around him. “I’ve been drawing since I have been able to hold a pencil,” he says.
While Elliot has never been a fan of graphic novels or comic books, he cites real-life people as his major inspirations.
“I think my work has definitely got influences of [cartoonist Michael] Leunig. There’s a lot of Barry Humphries in my work, but I also love Edward Gorey and Ralph Steadman. Brett Whiteley – recently I realised how much of his early work I’ve been influenced by. I’m also influenced by popular culture. There are certainly elements of Jim Henson in my work. I read a lot. I don’t really watch a lot of TV; I certainly don’t watch a lot of animation. If anything, my drawings come from real life. They come from photography and documentaries. I love Diane Arbus too, the photographer”.
Making art is essential to Elliot’s mental health. He likens drawing pictures and sculpting clay to yoga or therapy. “Even when I am making films, I still draw. It’s meditative. It’s a great cathartic tool and I think that’s why artists don’t have a choice. They have to create, because it’s the way they cope with the world,” Elliot says.
“If I had to make a Sophie’s choice and pick [either films or drawing], I would always go for drawing. First, for practical reasons, it’s so much cheaper than making a film. It’s quicker, it’s non-collaborative. You can do it anywhere in the world. It’s very liberating, and you have a lot of creative control and creative freedom. But also, it’s really where my mind tends to be. It’s at its most creative. And all my films, yes, they start with scripts, but they start with drawings,” he adds.
Sketching is part of Elliot’s daily routine, and he says it brings him enormous comfort. “Drawing is something I feel I have to do every day. Not because I’m forcing myself, but I just need to do it. It tempers any sort of anxiety. It’s a bit like listening to music. it’s very soothing and balances me out.”
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Elliot says when he was younger, his mental wellbeing was not considered a priority. “I think I neglected my mental health in my thirties and, when I turned 50, I made a lot of important decisions. I gave up drinking. So, I haven’t had a drink now for two and a half years. I gave up smoking, I gave up coffee, I gave up all the fun stuff.
“And now I just drink tea and draw pictures,” he adds with a laugh.
As he prepares for his debut art show, amid the release of his new feature length stop motion animation, Memoir of A Snail, Elliot says he is feeling both excited and nervous. He hopes viewers will find relief and humour in the characters he has created, and hopefully see themselves in his work.
“I’m interested in inner beauty”, Elliot says. “I want my characters to be endearing and empathetic. When you look at these characters [the aim is that] they remind you of someone, whether it’s a relative or, more often than not, yourself.
“I’m trying to get people to look at [the] warts and all”.
All the Lonely People is on display at Beinart Gallery, Melbourne, from 27 October until 17 November 2024. Memoir of a Snail will be on general release in Australia through Madman from 17 October 2024.
