Andrew initially went down the wrong path but his life changed when he rekindled his love of art
Andrew Kenrick
Andrew Kenrick used his love of art to overcome his teenage troubles (Image: Supplied/Andrew Kenrick)
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After a difficult start to life, Andrew Kenrick from Hoylake has turned his life around thanks to his love of art.
Looking back to his early life, Andrew said that his time in school was clouded by regularly being told to leave his lessons due to misbehaviour. However, it was as a result that he eventually found his aptitude for the thing he now loves most.
He told the ECHO: "I went to Wimbledon college, a highly selective boys grammar school. I loved art, and I went there when I was thrown out of other lessons. I saw it as a place of refuge and where you could get involved with things. I was an awkward belligerent teenager and the art master never asked me where I was supposed to be, so I just got on with painting."
After leaving school at 15, he began a nomadic lifestyle moving from country to country and city to city. The 72-year-old said: "I went travelling for a couple of years. I hitchhiked across Europe and lived in Turkey for five months on the beach and lived in Cornwall, and got up to mischief. I worked down a tin mine, I worked on a mackerel fishing boat, I worked in a slaughterhouse, I did all sorts of rubbish jobs."
Amid his time moving in-between jobs, he fell into a life of committing petty crimes. He said: "I had no income unless I worked, which I wasn't particularly inclined to do. We used to pinch milk bottles and stuff out of the back of the supermarket, and on one occasion, while I was living in Penzance, I found a key on the beach, and to my surprise, it fitted one of the beach huts where they sold chocolate. I had arranged to meet a mate of mine there at midnight, and he didn't show up, but I went in anyway and there was a policeman in there and one at the door."
Andrew Kenrick paintings
Andrew Kenrick has created a number of paintings of Liverpool FC's most famous moments(Image: Supplied/Andrew Kenrick)
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He added: "It was a bit scary because after two days [in the police station] I said 'You can't hold me anymore, you've got to charge me or release me' and they just beat the living daylights out of me and put me back in a cell. I thought 'I don't want to be this side of things.' I'm not a quitter, but I thought this is a battle I can't win, so they put me in a locked guard's van on a train to London to get out of Devon and Cornwall, and I luckily pulled myself together, did some work, got a place at art college."
After getting himself on the wrong side of the law for the last two years, he now had a place at art college in London and thought "why haven't I done this for a long time?"
While he had rekindled his love of art during his time at college, it wasn't until he met his ex-wife, who had been a teacher, that she convinced him that he should do the same. So, after completing his college course, instead of pursuing a career in the art world, he decided to take a teacher training course.
After later getting the teaching qualifications, he spent the next decades teaching art around the country spending time in Surrey, Nottinghamshire and Blackpool in a career that lasted until he retired in 2015.
As he looked back on his career, he recalled a particularly proud moment: "I think the most important thing you can do is open children's eyes to opportunities and possibilities. I found a drawing on my wall and I thought 'Who did that drawing?' And it was by a lad called Ed Poon, and he's now the the guy who remade the Tom & Jerry cartoons. He said he didn't even know he was good at art until he met me."
Having been a diehard Liverpool fan since his school days, amid Liverpool's period of dominance in the 1970s, he decided to capture some of his most memorable moments following the Reds with his paintbrush.
From 1974 to 1978, he painted some of the club's most famous moments, and while most photos and artwork from that era shows triumph from the perspective of the players on the pitch, Andrew decided to capture the jubilation of the fans instead. He said: "I was always more interested in the supporters than I was in the players."
Andrew Kenrick painting
Andrew's depiction of the scenes in Rome before Liverpool's European Cup final win against Borussia Monchengladbach(Image: Supplied/Andrew Kenrick)
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Having captured some of Liverpool's most historic moments including their 3-1 European Cup final win against Borussia Monchengladbach in 1977, one of his favourite paintings came a year earlier when Liverpool clinched the league title away at Wolves.
Looking back to that day 50 years ago, he said: "It was a momentous occasion. I'd seen Liverpool had won the league before at Anfield, and I'd been to lots of great games."
While he said that he mainly paints for his own satisfaction, after he shared some of his work with the Liverpool Supporters' Club, he couldn't help but get a buzz from their reaction. He said: "It's great when people say "Yeah, I was there [at that game in the painting] or 'I remember I stood here or that's me outside the ground'. "
Andrew's selection of Liverpool FC paintings is set to go on display at the Museum of Liverpool.