Peter Blake: Collage

The first complete overview of collage by the much-loved founder of Pop, Peter Blake

I feel free to go anywhere in the realm of art.
I believe that you can be diverse and serious at the same time.
There are no fences and no gates.
-Peter Blake

Peter Blake is one of Britain’s best-loved artists. A founder of British Pop art in the 1950s and widely known for his cover design for The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album, his celebration of popular culture is set in the public consciousness. In a career spanning seven decades, the practice of collage has remained at the heart of his iconic, groundbreaking imagery, from his early paintings depicting fragments of popular ephemera, to his found-object assemblages and constructions, his pasted-paper collages and his most recent use of inkjet printing and digital processes.

Peter Blake Collage provides the first comprehensive overview of Blake’s collage-making practice. With a foreword by David Hockney, an essay by Patrick Elliott, Chief Curator of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh, a recent interview with Peter Blake by Natalie Rudd, Senior Curator of the Arts Council Collection, over 250 colour reproductions and a newly compiled illustrated chronology.

'‘Peter understands that collage places one time on top of another, and so they present more than one perspective. His work looks back...but they are always really about the now and contemporary culture. Nobody has done anything quite like them. They’re terrific’'
David Hockney

'‘[Blake’s] collages display a pathological passion for collecting, sorting, grading and swapping things…. Blake is the puppet master, who makes things come to life, who transforms dreams into reality’ '
Patrick Elliott, Senior Curator, National Galleries of Scotland

About the Author

Peter Blake is one of Britain’s best-loved artists and founder of British Pop. Patrick Elliott is Senior Curator of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh. In 2019, he curated 'Cut and Paste: 400 Years of Collage', the first historical survey exhibition of collage. Natalie Rudd is Senior Curator of the Arts Council Collection. She first interviewed Peter Blake for the exhibition 'Peter Blake: About Collage' held at Tate Liverpool in 2001, and wrote an accompanying book.