For a centre back, Jay, you’re surprisingly creative.

I studied photography, graphic design and sculpture. I took a couple of painting classes and it’s something I just continued.

Didn’t one of your works, Industrial Evolution, do well at auction?

Sue Ryder Care [a healthcare charity] do a fundraiser every year called Art Liberating Lives. I did a painting for them last year, pictured below, for the second time and, yes, it was auctioned.

What’s your style and who are your influences?

I like M. C. Escher and Salvador Dali. I’m into tattoo art and I have a big M. C. Escher tattoo. I live in Camden in North London and there are little galleries there I’ll just walk into, and I go to the Tate now and again. I like abstract art and enjoy looking at other people’s art and reinterpreting it.

Before you made it at Watford you were doing a different kind of painting, weren’t you?

Yes, I worked as a painter and decorator in America and for a month here to earn extra money. If only my feet were as quick as my hands . . .

Art isn’t your only outside interest, though, is it?

I own a technology business in the States that’s doing really well. We provide content to people’s electronic devices — phones, PSPs, MP3 players — that’s related to events that they’re at. It’s called SongWhale because whales transmit wirelessly through water.

You could use it to give away the song you recorded in 2006, Soccer Rocks . . .

My friend owns a small record label. We wrote a song about football, kind of as a joke. But we released it and it raised lots of money for Cancer Research.

What did Watford fan Sir Elton John think?

He got a laugh out of it. I don’t think I’ll be supporting him on his tours any time soon.

Interview by Tom Dart

Jay DeMerit is not the only artistic sportsman. Jack Russell, the former England wicketkeeper, has his own gallery. Martin Speight, another former cricketer, has published a book of his artwork, while Jody Craddock, the 33-year-old Wolverhampton Wanderers defender, is a keen painter.