BILLY NYE ARTIST - QUESTIONS ABOUT ARTS PRACTICE

​BILLY NYE ARTIST
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

• What is your name and tell us one thing about you to describe yourself?

 
My name is Billy Nye, and I am a visual artist whose primary genre is printmaking.
I also work as a painter and digital artist.

• How did you come to art, has it always been with you since a child?

 This question has always bored me a little, because artists — whether visual or musical —   usually show signs from an early age.  For me, as a child, it was drawing comics. I was captivated by the bold flat colours, strong  lines, and the way an image could tell a story

• Were you trained in art or have you discovered it amongst having had a different career?

 
I first began my formal visual education after high school, after receiving a Best Artist Award at Frankston High School.
I enrolled in a Visual Arts Diploma at Frankston TAFE, however I later withdrew due to struggles with addiction, which I battled for the following decade before entering a sober program and rebuilding my life.
As a mature-age student, I returned to study at Chisholm and completed my Diploma of Visual Arts.  From there, I continued to expand my education with a Certificate IV in Workplace Training and Assessment,  followed by a double Bachelor of Arts in Fine Art and Visual Culture at Curtin University, Western Australia.

• What are the subjects you find you keep looking to, to inspire you to paint?

 
The subjects I return to most often for inspirations are rooted in the place I live and love: suburbia.
I spent twenty years living in London and New York, and when I returned to Australia I was struck by its individuality and sense of iconic nostalgia.
There is something very distinct about Australian suburbia — the way we inhabit our homes, and the emotional connection we have to the places we live.
During my university studies, I focused on and wrote about the disappearing Australian backyard, as I was witnessing a shift in both culture and landscape.
That idea has stayed with me ever since. My current work continues to explore suburbia, particularly Frankston and the Mornington Peninsula, where I live and work.
 

• How do you practice, is it daily, chaotically, what keeps you going?

 
This is a great question, because unlike some artists, I rarely have a moment when I am not creating. Ideas come naturally, and inspiration from my surroundings feels constant and ongoing.
At times I have so many ideas that I’m working across multiple projects at once. My main limitation is time — there is never quite enough of it to make all the work I want to make. My practice is daily, and it feels more like a way of living than something I step in and out of.
I also find it difficult to take a complete day off from making. Even when I’m not in the studio, I’m thinking through ideas or developing concepts.
The introduction of the iPad has been particularly helpful, allowing me to continue creating digitally and map out new works wherever I am.

• Are you hard on yourself?

 
Yes, I am extremely hard on myself. If I am not creating, selling, making, or fully engaged in my art,
I can become depressed. I tend to feel lazy or out of balance when I’m not in my practice.
My art practice is very important to me, and I often feel as though I am running out of time. I have a strong urgency to make my mark and to do it now.
 

• Who is your biggest champion and how do they help you with perseverance through any challenges you may have had

 
My biggest champion is, without a doubt, my husband David. He has supported me as a wife and a mother, through my studies, and through significant mental health challenges.
 He has been my rock and my strongest supporter, and his unconditional love has allowed me to grow into the artist I am today.
He is now very unwell with a rare neurological illness, which means I have become his primary supporter and carer.
Our roles have shifted, but the commitment between us remains the same.
There is no other person I can say has supported me so completely in reaching my goals, or who has stood beside me through every stage of my life and practice.
 

• Have you worked in other disciplines in art?

 
In London, I worked for a photography company and was also a member of the London Photography Club, one of the oldest camera clubs in England.
In the United States, I worked as a real estate photographer and also created model portfolios independently in my own time.
 

• Who are your heroes’s in art and why are you attracted to them?

 
Most people familiar with art can probably guess who my heroes are: Reg Mombassa (Chris O’Doherty), David Hockney, Jeffrey Smart, Margaret Preston, and of course Howard Arkley.
I’m drawn to Reg Mombassa for his subject matter—winding roads, telegraph poles, suburbia, and the quiet tension between nature and the built environment. His printmaking practice is also something I deeply admire.
David Hockney inspires me through his relentless productivity and his refusal to be confined to one medium. Painting, photography, printmaking, digital work—he moves across them all with curiosity and energy.
Jeffrey Smart’s meticulously composed urban landscapes transform ordinary industrial scenes into something precise, ordered, and slightly surreal. His work shows how structure and geometry can hold emotional weight.
Margaret Preston has been a constant influence on Australian printmakers. Her woodcuts of Mosman Bay and Sydney Harbour remain powerful examples of how clarity, design, and subject can come together with such strength.
Howard Arkley brings the suburb into technicolour focus. His bold, airbrushed surfaces and vivid colour palettes turn everyday Australian housing and interiors into something electric, almost theatrical—celebrating the ordinary while pushing it into the extraordinary.
These five artists are my absolute favourites.
 

• What do you think is the difference between a good artist and a great artist?

 
Work ethic and commitment are essential, whether or not you become famous. So too is passion for the process itself. It is not only about the outcome, but about the making.
An artist’s process is a kind of journey—something lived through rather than simply completed. If it were only about the final result, you could call yourself an artist, sure.
But a great artist is consumed by the process: the thinking, the testing, the failures, and the gradual unfolding of the work.
It is the entire act of making that matters, not just the finished piece.
 

• Having held the honour of being one of the DACE Feature Artists, can you describe the experience of working towards the exhibition and how the event went for you at the time?

 
My feature artist event was cancelled due to COVID and the closure of the show. We were in the process of making the banners and posters for the exhibition—my work was to be featured outside the venue. I was making work specifically for the show and getting everything framed in advance. I was organised and genuinely excited.
Then COVID came and it all fell apart. I was very upset at the time.
I wrote to National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA) explaining what had happened, how disappointed I was, and how much money I had already spent. In response, they provided me with a grant for artists financially impacted by COVID. They also sent a letter of support acknowledging my contribution to the arts and recognising me as a practicing artist in a formal sense. It all worked out in the end. I never formally became the Feature Artist—but I was asked, and in that sense, I suppose I was.

• For any young artist that may see this and is looking to you for a piece of gold advice, do you have anything you could share?

 
My advice is this: don’t depend on others to make it happen for you. Be in charge of your own direction. Build your own website, show your work on social media, and take responsibility for how your practice is seen.
If someone asks you to do something, say yes. Throw yourself into the arts and be present. Work hard and stay committed.
It has taken me decades to get here, and as I look back I can be proud. I never relied on anyone else to make it happen—I put myself forward. In the beginning it was hard, with no sales and plenty of rejection, but I never gave up. How could I? I had to make art.
Once I started making work that I was truly passionate about, other people began to see it. They connected with the joy and the intent in what I was creating. That connection is the icing on the cake.
So make it happen for yourself. Get out there and do the work.

Olivers Hill II - Hand painted Linocut - Billy Nye Printmaker