< INTELLIGENCER Trevor Bates at work "My wife doesn't like to work in bright light," said Bates. Bates says art is an obsession for the couple. "I like to have my mind wrapped _arpund my work... I'm not too socia- ble. I can say"whatever needs"to be said to a person within five minutes," said Bates. Animals are a big part of his work. Bates explained that animals are what they are and can not be any- thing else. Lik- ing the fact that they do what they do because they lack the a b i l i t y t o change, he con- c l u d e d t h a t their innocence and simplicity intrigues him, making them t h e m o s t appealing sub- jects for him to draw and work with. Asked what he likes to do beyond art, he paused, his eyes clouded over with confusion. After another pause, he said he could not contemplate doing anything else. "What other kinds of things do people do these days?" asked Bates. When Bates was younger, living in London, England, he was a dreamer, always collecting butterflies and rid- ing horses. Despite his father's attempts to get him interested in playing rough sports with all the other children his age, Bates contin- ued to be a dreamer and could not be swayed to change. At 19, his interest in art was buried under pressures to join the army as a fighter pilot in the Second World War. But art was in Bates' blood. With his grandfather Henry being a family legend as a famous sculptor in London, Bates did not go to the Slade School of Fine Art, London Uni- versity to study sculpture because he didn't think he would be able to meet his family's standards. PHOTO BY BECKY POCOCK -- a labour of love. "His work was always around when I was a child, my grandmother had a lot of it. Seeing his work put me off sculpture because lie was so clever. I didn't think I would ever meet the standard and I figured the family would judge my work harder," said Bates. But once his days as a fighter pilot were over, fate would have it that the art school in London did not have any openings in the painting course. The sculpture • course was the next best thing and he ended up being award- ed with the sculpture prize that year too. Bates later* t a u g h t l i f e , drawing classes at Saint Mary School in Lon- don and later was head of the sculpture department at the Hornsey College of Art in London. "I found by teaching people less, I was actually teaching them more. I didn't want to show or tell them how to paint or create sculptures, I want- ed them to do what they wanted to do and then I would tell them what I thought of it," said Bates. In 1967, Bates moved to Canada and taught in New Brunswick and at St. Lawrence College and Loyalist Col- lege. Bates' whole life has rotated around art, straight to the present. "Art becomes a drug to keep your mind off of things. When you stop doing it you feel depressed because you have to worry about the state of the world," said Bates. Away from the stresses of life Bates feels happiest. Distributing his time, Bates' favourite places remain to be Gallery-One-Twenty-One and the red brick house, where Bates and his wife will remain among the ferns, allowing art to consume and mold their lives. i 8