@ArtUnderTheHood Interview Series: 5 Minutes with Jo Peel

Q. Can you describe what your inter­pret­a­tion of Art is?

I sup­pose my inter­pret­a­tion of Art is get­ting the inform­a­tion inside my head out and  shar­ing it – it does­n’t neces­sar­ily have to be shared but cre­at­ively I like to express myself and I am not very good with words lol so I use pic­tures to think visu­ally. So when I get a piece of paper in front of me I just love to draw and it just happens.

Q. And then those Draw­ings go up on massive huge walls about the place?

Lol Yeah.. I think the big walls thing is because I like being out­side and I like the phys­ic­al nature of push­ing your­self. You lose your­self in the real­ity of mak­ing a piece of work so you don’t have time to really think about the finer details and deal­ing with things so that makes it more fun.

Q. That’s great! So you lose your­self in it, but do you find your­self at the end of it?

I am nev­er lost or found really I am just level… maybe!

Q. Do you con­sider it help­ful at any­time in the pro­cess of cre­at­ing a piece to ask your­self if you have learnt any­thing about you – is that some­thing you would consider? 

I don’t nor­mally think about myself dur­ing or when I am mak­ing an Art­work. I don’t know I guess I am very prac­tic­al about it and its just a case of mak­ing the piece work and try­ing to get it down in the way I have envis­aged it. Yeah I don’t really like to look back on a piece of work I like to move for­ward on to the next one, I keep learn­ing and keep improving.

Q. So the action & actu­al doing is the pro­cess for you then?

Yeah!

Q. A ques­tion I con­sider quite import­ant to Artists gen­er­ally and it may be spe­cif­ic to you – I have met with many Artists who have what I call an inner crit­ic – like a sub aspect of them­selves – does Jo Peel have her own inner crit­ic or ever had an inner critic? 

Yeah con­stantly, I think that’s why I don’t look back on my work. If I look back I kind of hate it because its done and its out there and the next piece is always gonna be bet­ter and I am always gonna improve.

Q.  It already is what it is leave it be — is that what you are saying?

Yeah you’ve made a mis­take that’s cool just get on with it and do some­thing better.

Q. That’s part of learn­ing too right?

Yeah I don’t dwell on it or beat myself up about it! I just always think I have some­thing bet­ter to do and I have not got there yet and that’s really excit­ing for me and keeps me going.

Q. So kind of elab­or­at­ing on a sim­il­ar sort of ques­tion then – Lets reflect back to when we first met and you were doing a three week pro­ject to con­dense into a 3 minute anim­a­tion at Vil­lage under­ground. So if I were to say now reflect­ing back on that how do you feel about that – is there an inner crit­ic there say­ing “well it was alright, its not good enough – Could do bet­ter…? Or do you look back and smile and say Wow I cre­ated that?

Yeah Pretty Much. I try not to watch it and I don’t really look at it I just sort of think that I am glad I man­aged to do it I sup­pose and I have learned a lot.  I had nev­er done any­thing like it before so I was learn­ing and was pleased with what I did but if I watch it again all I see is the mis­takes lol or I don’t see any­thing. Maybe when I am like 80 I will look back and go “Oh Actu­ally that was alright!” 

[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/40526194[/vimeo]

Q. So what would be the next big chal­lenge then for Jo Peel?

No chal­lenges yet I think once I have just fin­ished some­thing I am sort of happy because of hav­ing finished.

Q. Bit like a wind­ing down peri­od then?

Yeah – edit the foot­age, get on with my next show and go for a big walk somewhere…

Q. Flick a Friz­bee or Fly a Kite maybe? 

Yeah I like those things and just chill out. I really enjoy­ing being with friends and hanging out.

Q. Good Stuff!  Do you have any­one you would like to give a shout out to or a mes­sage to or any­one you want to say some­thing to?

I just want to say a massive massive thanks to every­one who helped out on the pro­ject I have just done because they were lit­er­ally the most incred­ible people with patience and tol­er­ance who put up with com­ing and help­ing me in snow bliz­zards when the paint froze!  It was really hard work so thanks to every­one at The Red Quar­ters and every­one who helped out as I actu­ally enjoyed it because they were there.   Massive thanks to Gary at Altern­at­ive Lon­don for mak­ing everything so nice for us.

For more info and images please vis­it  Ben Oakley Gal­lery and Joe Peel Website

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Gata Malandra

Edit­or / Research­er at No Bounds

Gata is a music and arts lov­er, stud­ied anthro­po­logy, art man­age­ment and media pro­duc­tion ded­ic­at­ing most of her time to cre­at­ive pro­jects pro­duced by No Bounds.

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