Sahaja Budzilla

Sahaja Budzilla is a visual artist based in West Limerick. He creates figurative metal sculptures from old tools and he also paints. Sahaja received an Arts and Disability Connect Mentoring award in 2019.

Tell us about your art.
I grew up in Manchester, in an Irish Catholic family. I left home as soon as I could, at the age of fifteen. I took as many drugs as I could. Everything felt empty and nothing made sense. I got into Buddhism in my teens. For me making art is like the character Roy Neary from the film Close Encounters of the Third Kind who makes models of mountains. He doesn’t know why he is doing it but he is compelled to do so. Making art is my main way of understanding my life and what it is to be human.

When I was in my second year of art college I started welding and I loved it from the first moment. Working with metal is like my first language. I make sculptures of figures and animals from old metal tools. My sculptures have elements of traditional Buddhist figures and symbols, as well as mythical creatures. When I haven’t been able to make sculptures due to not having the resources or space, I have turned to painting which is like my second language. The sculptures come from a more primitive place. The paintings are more about my process and my relationship with others. I’ve never been into meditation, making art is my way of practicing Buddhism.

Where are you based?
Glensharrold, West Limerick.

What are you working on at the moment?
I’ve just finished a series of sixteen paintings. Each painting relates to a line of a Buddhist mantra that I have translated to reflect my life and process. My translation of the mantra is more nihilistic and apocalyptic than the traditional one. I created the paintings over about three weeks. I could feel the effect of creating the series, like I went down into my psyche and came out the other side. I’m also making a sculpture of a cow. It’s about six feet high and is more totemic than representational. I have a pretty small welding shed so it’s a tight fit. It’s expensive making sculpture so I’m waiting until I get the money together to buy more grinding and cutting discs to complete it.

Can you tell us a little bit about your career path as an artist? How did you get to where you are now?
I have never related to being an artist as a career. It is just who I am and what I do. As a punk in my teenage years, I would make my own clothes and make things out of stuff from skips. I went to catering college and worked in a vegetarian café in Norwich for a few years. When I moved back to Manchester, I went to art classes and applied to do an art foundation course. I didn’t get in but I was accepted for the degree course the same year. After art college, I got a studio at Dean Clough Studios in Halifax from 1992-2002. Without access to a sculpture studio after that, I started making collages and got into painting.

In 2009 a relationship I was in broke down and I lost my home. I ended up moving around and staying with friends for a few years. I managed to keep painting most of that time.

I got together with my partner Jutika Siobhan Healy in 2012, though we were friends when I was at art college. I moved over to Ireland with her and it has taken a few years but we have settled not far from where Siobhan grew up. Without Siobhan’s support I wouldn’t be doing this interview. As well as being dyslexic, I’ve had Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) for the last nine years. I find taking in information and writing really tiring and I easily get overwhelmed filling in forms and answering questions! Siobhan collaborates with me in making art and supports me to connect with the art world.

If you have been a recipient of an Arts and Disability Connect Award, how has this impacted your career path as an artist?
I received an Arts and Disability Connect Mentoring award to work with Brian Maguire in 2019. I had seen Brian on a TV programme on RTÉ called Outsiders about teaching art in prisons and outsider art. I was struck by Brian’s openness and down to earth attitude. When I approached him to ask if he would be interested in being my mentor, I was surprised he agreed. He came to visit me at my home studio. Having CFS means I find it difficult to travel so I really appreciated his visits. Through Brian I am more connected to the art world and less isolated. This gives my practice as an artist more meaning and gives me a bigger context.

Are there any standout moments in your career as an artist?
Getting into art college was a standout moment. I left school with nothing. I was the only person from my family that got a degree which at the time was a massive thing. After college, I answered an ad in the paper for a free studio at Dean Clough Studios in Halifax in 1992. I applied and was accepted so that was a high point getting a studio for free where I could just get on with my work. For about ten years I had a studio there and I was set up with all the equipment I needed to work with metal. I got enough commissions and work in schools to live on. To save money, I squatted in my studio, which at times was hard as it wasn’t really set up for living in. When they redeveloped the building in 2002 I had to go. When I couldn’t sculpt anymore, I went back to drawing, painting and making collage.

Since 2018 I’ve been settled enough to make sculptures again. The set-up is very basic, but it means a lot to me to be back welding.

Who or what are the most important influences on your art?
Giacometti influenced my sculpture at the beginning. If you see my work from twenty-five years ago, you can see that. My sculptures these days have shamanic elements and some of the figures are based on traditional Buddhist figures. In my paintings you can see the influence of Basquiat.

What have been the greatest challenges of your career so far?
The greatest challenge for me has always been earning a living from selling my art. I have always felt like an outsider in the art world and struggled to find my context. I have made sculptures for Buddhist centres, but they don’t pay well. I have made some public art that you can see in different places in the North of England. Living with CFS is a daily challenge. I have a few hours some mornings where I am well enough to do some welding or painting but most afternoons and evenings, I am wrecked. It really pares everything down to the basics.

Who is your favourite artist?
This question doesn’t sit right with me as I haven’t really got one. Giacometti has been the biggest influence in the past but as I get older, I feel more kinship with the anonymous tribesman who make a ritual mask or anyone throughout history who has made things of meaning from the materials that are around them.

What do you like to do for fun?
I play games like Call of Duty or Medal of Honour on PlayStation. When I’m tired it helps my body relax and keeps me occupied. With the newer games, there is so much going on, I find it hard to follow them.

When I’m painting, I have films on in the background or music playing. I read science fiction novels. Philip K. Dick is one of the sci-fi authors I like best. We have two dogs and live in the countryside so when I have the energy, I take them for walks. I only have the energy to socialise in the morning, so we have a few neighbours that are up for a chat and a coffee every now and then.

Biography
Sahaja Budzilla grew up in an Irish family in Manchester. In his teens he found both art and Buddhism. Later he completed a Fine Art Degree, was ordained as a Buddhist and given the name Sahaja.

He discovered his natural medium in metal sculpture. After college he got a studio at Dean Clough Studios in Yorkshire and had a prolific ten-year period of working in metal. He lost his studio space, and this led to a long period of struggle and re-evaluation. This culminated in reinventing himself as a painter, using a mix of paint and collage.

The name Sahaja means ‘natural, innate, spontaneous, born with…’ His art is about exploring what it means to be human and the transformation of self. He lives in West Limerick with his partner. Since moving to Ireland in 2014 he has been exploring; abstract and figurative painting, Buddha figures and self-portraits, relationships, tensions and dynamics between male and female, trauma and healing. In a way his work is all about the relationship to oneself, inner and outer worlds and about congruence.

In 2018 he started making sculptures after a break of fifteen years. From broken tools and discarded metal, he makes mythical figures of power, grace and humour.

www.sahajaart.com