Blake, Sir Peter

Blake, Sir Peter (1932– ). British painter, sculptor, and designer, a leading Pop artist. He was born in Dartford, Kent, and studied at Gravesend School of Art, 1949–51, then after two years in the RAF at the Royal College of Art, 1953–6. In 1956–7 a Leverhulme scholarship enabled him to travel extensively on the Continent studying folk and popular art (this had been an interest since his teenage years, stimulated by visits to fairgrounds). His early work was meticulously painted and often featured items of popular ephemera, particularly magazine covers (On the Balcony, Tate Gallery, London, 1955–7). From 1959 he moved more into the mainstream of Pop with pictures of pop singers and film stars, painted in a much broader manner and often featuring collage elements, and within a few years had become established as one of the leading figures of the movement in England (in 1961 he won first prize in the Junior Section of the John Moores Liverpool Exhibition and in the same year he was featured in Ken Russell's television film Pop Goes the Easel, which did as much as anything to arouse public interest in Pop art). During the 1960s the pop music world continued to be a major source of inspiration (his most famous work is the cover design for the Beatles LP Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, 1967), and his other favourite images of the time included fairground wrestlers and striptease dancers.

In 1969 Blake moved to Wellow, near Bath, and in 1975 he was one of the founders of the Brotherhood of Ruralists, a seven-strong group of painters who took as their inspiration ‘the spirit of the countryside'. A series of winsome fairy paintings are characteristic of his Ruralist phase. They show something of the combination of sophistication and naivety that often occurs in his work as well as his penchant for imagery drawn from childhood (his two daughters have often featured in his work). He returned to London in 1979 and since then he has continued to paint both contemporary and fantasy subjects. In 1983 he had a major retrospective exhibition at the Tate Gallery, London; it proved a great popular success, showing how fondly his early work is regarded by many people for its colourful evocation of the ‘swinging sixties'. In 1994–6 he was Associate Artist at the National Gallery, London.