A new London exhibition of the prolific pop artist's work puts his fascination with familiar faces under the gallery spotlights
Sir Peter Blake is one of those rare artists whose oeuvre is so well known, so celebrated, that his name has been elevated to almost mythical status. Born in Kent in 1932, he burst onto the British Pop Art scene in the late 1950s, when his large-scale paintings, laden with references to wrestling, contemporary advertising and music hall entertainment, earned him instant acclaim. When, in 1963, he created the artwork for the album cover of the Beatles' iconic Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, therefore, his renown spiralled – and before long, he was widely considered one of the best-known artists of his generation.
As well as a painter, Blake is also a prolific collector. "I was seven when the second world war started so I was evacuated away – that was almost a missing piece of my life from seven to 14," Blake told AnOther Magazine in 2011. "At that very point when the war ended and I started to go to art school, having never had the opportunity to collect anything, at the age of 14 I went into a junk shop in Gravesend where the art school was and I bought a painting of the Queen Mary – an outsider art painting, a papier maché tray and a complete set of Shakespeare – because I’d never had any books either. Since then I have always been collecting." From those minor objects to a sprawling collection of Elvis memorabilia, elephant figurines, taxidermy, autographs and works by his peers, his archive of memorabilia has escalated to become an extension of his work itself.
Keen to highlight the symbiotic relationship between his creative output and his collected one, a new exhibition entitled Portraits and People at London's Waddington Custot gallery places the two side by side, in a parallel celebration of people. “It is a very personal show and one I have wanted to do for a long time," Blake explains, "bringing together portraits of people I have met, and been close to, and others I have admired."
Examples of work on show include his famous early Wrestler paintings and Circus Act series, some of which have never been exhibited before, alongside more portrait work so fresh from the studio that he had to rush to finish them. "In my portraits, the most important thing is to show a likeness both visually and also through more intimate aspects of a subject’s appearance. Their stance and the objects that surround them in their home."
Peter Blake: Portraits and People is at Waddington Custot Galleries, London, until January 30, 2016.
