Charley Peters
Which 3 words best define how you would like your art to be perceived?
INNOVATIVE, BRAVE and COMPLEX.
What creative challenge have you faced and overcome that has transformed your art practice?
For me the most beneficial thing has been finding the ability to stop thinking and make work less consciously. I have a very busy mind that isn’t easy for me to switch off, but when I’m painting, especially at the start of new works, I have found a way to be able to use my intuition and just start painting without knowing where the work is going.
It’s similar to what Agnes Martin said about painting with her back to the world. You have to be brave to work without a plan and to trust yourself to make decisions that are true to you in the moment, but once I was able to do this I felt free to make paintings that where honest and alive.
What tools do you use as part of the preliminary stages of your process?
Research is a difficult thing for me to locate in what I do in the studio. I think it’s a cumulative process; I don’t read much now but for years I did, so there is ‘knowledge’ available to me as part of a catalogue of ‘stuff’ in my head. I have sketchbooks in the studio but don’t use these much anymore either – although they are full of thoughts that I am still developing through my work years later.
I am much more likely to just start painting by laying down a field of colour and then I’ll try to record feelings about what to do with the work next. I never write notes in words – for me the written language and the painted one are two separate things so text won’t help me - any thoughts I do have are recorded visually in quick, small automatic drawings that look like scribbles. I’m never sure how helpful they are but they seem to unlock something that helps me to move forward with a painting.
How do you usually start an art session - any habits or rituals?
I like to have 1-2 cups of coffee in the morning, I love coffee. Then I put on my overalls and just get started.
How do you deal with doubts and fears?
Doubts and fears are part of being an artist, it’s a strange and uncertain career that necessitates you being open to failure every day. I think it’s good to own these difficult feelings. As an artist I never know what I’m doing but at the same time I completely do. I have to trust myself to make good paintings because I know that I can and because I’m sure that’s the reason I exist. I have an inner confidence in my ability to make good work but most stages of the creative process are filled with doubt (fear, less so for me…I try not to be scared of many things).
In the end I know that I have to make my work and nothing can get in the way of that…and they are only paintings, if they go wrong then I can paint over things and make them right. Doubts and fears aren’t the same thing as work, they are the opposite really, it’s best to acknowledge that they are there but to also have the resolve to not give a shit and carry on anyway.
With what intentions do you infuse your art making?
There is no message or meaning in my work, primarily I make work that is ‘about’ painting. I have certain consistent concerns within my work but they are formal rather than thematic, relating back to the history of modernism and its legacy in the visual world today.
Although there’s no deliberate intention to provoke specific thoughts in the viewer, I do want people to slow down and really look at my paintings. I do this by using different painting techniques that slow down or speed up both the process of painting and the experience of looking. And I hope to make paintings that challenge where abstraction can be positioned today, where its boundaries are and what it feels like to mess these up a little bit.
Where do you draw your colour inspiration from?
This is difficult to answer, I think that colour is something that I use intuitively and without much conscious thought. My colour palette is quite specific, as I think is the case for most artists. I think of colour as being like handwriting, it just comes out as it does, there’s something about it that is inherently ‘mine’. There are elements of control and taste involved, but mostly I think I just put colours next to each other to see what happens and try to make it work.
I never use earthy or natural colours, my colour sensibility is strong and high key, maybe this is because I’ve always lived in the city and am used to seeing things by artificial lighting. And I watched a lot of cartoons as a child, I do sometimes think these things have had an impact on how I’ve been socialised in terms of colour. Inspiration never just comes from one place, I think it’s a mixture of lots of things we’ve seen, heard and felt over time.
What is something absurd that you love doing ?
I don’t know if this is absurd or not but I don’t really like eating outdoors. I don’t like the taste of air in my food so even if I’m eating at home in the summer I close the windows before I eat. I don’t like picnics either. I’m aware that some people find this strange…
What do you like about your work, what do you dislike about it?
I like that my work presents constant challenges for me, that I feel creatively fulfilled and like each time I finish a painting it’s like I’ve won a battle with materials, time, patience and logic. What I dislike is how hard painting is – my work is quite technically challenging sometimes and laborious, but I guess that’s part of what makes it challenging and fulfilling. I wish I had more hours in my day so make more paintings, I have a lot of energy and feel like I could always be doing more. I love how every painting I make generates starting points for 100 more paintings but this is frustrating too because I know that I’ll never have enough time to make as many paintings as I want to.
What do you tell yourself to keep out of procrastination?
I’m not a big procrastinator. I usually have the opposite problem of not being able to relax or stop doing things. I think that if I ever have an uncertain start to the day in the studio then as soon as I start to work things feel better, difficult feelings about starting work will only ever go away by me just getting on with it – once I start painting everything always feels ok.
What brilliant piece of advice were you given on your creative journey and would be happy to share?
It’s not advice as such but I always come back to Sol Lewitt’s letter to Eva Hesse. It’s my favourite piece of writing by an artist and is a great reminder of the importance of not thinking and just doing. It’s the best advice on how creativity isn’t something that can be adequately expressed in words or thoughts and can only be truly articulated through the act of making.
