Peter Blundell

                  

 

Can you briefly describe what you do?

I make paintings in oil on canvas on a domestic scale. I use handmade stencils cut from card to create compositions that I cannot fully anticipate. The paintings are built up in layers over time, sometimes I try to ignore what is on the surface at other times I will re-trace the forms onto a new layer. The intention is resolve the painting into a concrete pictorial form. It is very open to begin with and goes through many changes but after a time the painting determines itself.

What drives you to make work?

Painting for me is an outlet, a release that helps me channel thought, experience and allows for an element of risk to be taken into an on-going activity. I enjoy the feeling of being immersed in a prolonged exploration of my own making where I don’t know the outcome.

Can you tell me something of your day-to-day working practices?

I work on around fifteen paintings in the studio at any one time. I select a painting to work on for the session. Sometimes I begin painting immediately, at other times I may loosen up by drawing or cutting out a stencil to use. I most often paint flat on a table and begin by wiping down or painting over a previous layer.

How long have you been working in that way?

I have worked in this way since studying at Central St. Martins in 2006. Prior to this, I made more systems-based paintings that were completed in a single session. I used grids and structural motifs worked out beforehand in studies to regulate the flow of paint. My current work is a reaction to that way of working in that it evolves organically and is resolved over a longer period.

Which artists have had the greatest affect on your work?

I don’t feel directly influenced by any one artist when I am making the work in the studio, however after a while I see aspects of other artists work emerge in mine. Recently I might have recognised Jean Fautrier, El Greco and Jessica Stockholder, although maybe not all in one painting!

What, outside visual art, informs your practice?

I guess playing bass guitar and vocalising in Temperatures informs the painting practice in some way. We fall in and out of grooves and patterns in the music which is all improvised so there is a clear element of risk added to a real-time live performance.

How would you like people to engage with your work?

I’d be just happy if they engaged with it at all, but I guess equal measures of puzzlement and joy would be good.