Feature: Interview - Mark Cass - Hampstead businessman on a mission to shake up the art world

Published: 26 August 2010
by PETER GRUNER

YOU may not have heard of him yet but Hampstead man Mark Cass is on a mission to shake up the art world.

We’re sitting in a ­coffee shop at the Angel, where his Cass Art business command centre is located. He immediately becomes animated: “I want to take on the art elite and make them sit up. I want everyone to shed their inhibitions, pick up their brushes or pencils, and start being creative.”

Mark, 51, is variously described as the Richard Branson or Jamie Oliver of the art world.

His fifth art materials store officially opens on Saturday September 4, this time in Heath Street, Hampstead, just up from the Tube.

Don’t think you can draw and paint? Come on, stop being hard on yourself, says Mark. He argues that, unlike cooking and reality TV, where people have no fears about exposing themselves to a critical world, the realm of “people” art is fraught with fears and insecurities.

Of course, he would say that wouldn’t he? Mark has got a big interest in our artistic endeavours. He runs Britain’s biggest discount art material chain, with outlets in Angel, Charing Cross, Soho and High Street Kensington.

But he also comes from a family of patrons who have raised millions to support British art. His father Wilfred won the CBE for services to art in 2006 and runs    the Cass Sculpture Foundation in Goodwood, West Sussex, a charity set up in 1992 to finance and commission new works.

“Most of us paint and draw quite happily for the first 12 years of life,” says Mark, who admits that he also is a bit of a frustrated artist. “And then we give it up. We don’t think we have the talent or the time. We’re always comparing ourselves unfavourably with others.

“But you don’t have to be a creative genius to enjoy a bit of a dabble with a pen or pencil or a pot of paint. Being creative is all about self-expression. Whether it is any good or not is not important. How do you judge? It’s all subjective. 

“People should enjoy what they create and not feel embarrassed by it. Even a doodle is an indication of what you might be thinking about and a statement of yourself which is unique. And art can also be a form of therapy. Look at wartime leader Winston Churchill – he painted landscapes to take his mind off affairs of state.”

Already Mark is seeing signs that people are becoming more creative. Instead of buying greeting cards, customers are designing their own and parents are buying painting kits for children’s parties. Also, older people are returning to painting and drawing after years of artistic inactivity.

“In a recession, people have more time on their hands if they are unemployed,” he says. “So painting can be a good relaxing hobby to fill in the time before jobs.”

Mark moved into the business side of art not long after college, aged 19. His hobbies are collecting and taking photo images, which he describes as a theme through his life. He worked in a camera store in the early days and spent many years building the stock photography business in the UK called Image Bank. 

“I’m lucky that my passion for art has kept me close to businesses that are art-related,” he says. 

“We today employ 64 members of staff, all passionate about art too. They will give you excellent advice. For example, you can get a good box of eight oils for £12.95 or a box of 48 acrylics at less than 50p each.”

Mark says he would like to open two new shops a year with an eventual aim of 15 to 20 across Britain. 

“The art supply business grew the most in the 1960s as people were a lot less self-critical,” he adds. 

“The slogan in those days was ‘Do your own thing’. I can see that this idea is coming back and we need to encourage it.”

• The first 1,000 people through the door of the new Hampstead store will get a goodie bag with £50 worth of materials