Today we’d like to introduce you to Jeff Peters.
Hi Jeff, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I was born in Long Beach California and spent most of my childhood in Fullerton. A pretty normal late eighties and nineties youth, a group of boys mesmerized by skateboarding, surfing and music. My mother was an interior designer and would introduce me to the things she found interesting which opened a door to thinking about beauty, this worked well to balance out the youthful need to embrace anything that was rebellious and punk. it was Norton Simon and The Stooges, Flemish tapestries and Black Sabbath, preciousness and destruction. I don’t recall at what age but I remember being fascinating with how things came to be visually, I would draw anything that interested me, a lesson in following impulses, car ads in the newspaper, headline photos, objects around the house. I would sneak into my sister’s room and steal things to draw that were foreign or new to me, my brother passed out on the couch was my first model, drawing the cover of my favorite records, any strange or mundane imagery that came via the mail. It was all a lesson. Soon my mother was asking me for specific things that could work in her interiors, paintings and drawings. I was happy to oblige.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I had no idea how to exist as an artist, It never mattered at the start, it was about traveling through Europe, New York and Los Angeles determined to see great objects and paintings in person. Once I realized I needed time to work, it was about finding jobs that could afford me that time to myself. Lots of labor jobs with great people, restaurant work, light construction, art installing. I was happy to eventually get a job at the Laguna College of art and Design teaching drawing, painting and figure drawing. I loved the people and the work during that time but I knew that making it as an artist was going to mean selling work, making a living and focusing solely on painting.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I make paintings, drawings and a variety of other forms of art. Most of the paintings I make end up in homes, hotels or corporate environments. Sometimes the work is small and intimate and sometimes it is very large where I need to hire specialized assistants. I like to keep the content balanced between a type of realism and abstraction, it’s real, but not quite. I make a lot of small paintings and drawings of subjects that I am interested in, these are from observation, then when I make a large painting I usually just go from the memory of that thing, so I can’t help but to internalize it. A fruit tree I will begin by letting the color and shape tell me what is next, a composition made from shapes. I like to mix a pre-determined palette, sometimes I steal these palettes from luxury brands like Hermes or from household products, advertisements or film stills. This process is the same as I work through a variety of subjects, Interiors, the sun, the moon, the horizon of the ocean, trees, plants and portraiture. As far as proud of, I am just happy that I get this life. I wake up early, I work six days a week, I come to the studio and continue to work on whatever problem I was working on solving the day before. It is a lot of work to run a business where one person does everything, but it’s also the best thing in the world.
We all have a different way of looking at and defining success. How do you define success?
It’s so elusive that word. I leave the studio feeling like a made progress in whatever that means in a particular week, then I leave and come back in the morning feeling like that wasn’t progress at all, it was actually failing. It’s a humbling thing. But yes, sales and depositing checks can feel great because you don’t feel like an alien, like what I am doing is allowing me to have a warm home and a family. Success though, I have this image of being old and not being able to move, asking myself what was I after by becoming an artist? did I find my muse or my purpose? I think not being able to answer that question keeps me driving to the net, playing the game as best I can, with everything I have, taking it all seriously. This makes me feel successful.
Contact Info:
- Website: jeffpetersstudio.com
- Instagram: @jefffpeters
Image Credits
All images Jeff Peters
