Interview with CORY W.PEEKE

q)Please tell us a brief info about yourself.

a)I’m a 49-year-old man. I live and work in La Grande, Oregon USA. I share a home with my partner Neil and our basset hound Lorelai. I’m a professor of Art at Eastern Oregon University and also direct the university’s Nightingale Gallery.

q)Tell us about your humble beginnings, When did you first realized that you wanted to be an artist?

a)I’ve been drawing since I was very little. I always had crayons and my father worked in the printing industry so he was always bringing home end rolls of paper from the presses, this gave me an endless supply.

As far as consciously intending to be an artist, that didn’t happen until college. I initially went to school to study advertising design but quickly realized I wanted to make work for my own reasons not to sell someone else’s product.

q)What are your tools?

a)X-acto knife, scissors, glue and lots of found images and a variety of substrates.

q)Who or what gives you inspiration?

a)My students are a big inspiration. I am also inspired by all the excellent collage work being made today. With social media, it is so easy to see and explore what other collagists around the world are doing right now.

q)Is your artistic background self-taught or did you go to college to study?

a)I would say a bit of both. I went to Kendall College of Art & Design to study but primarily concentrated on painting and drawing after changing my major from advertising. I didn’t really begin to do collage until after undergraduate school. I spent some time after school in San Francisco with very little money and no money for art supplies. This is when I really began to explore collage as I was just using materials (cardboard and paper) I would find on the street.

q)How do you keep “fresh” within your industry?

a)I’m not sure I know. I just do what I do. My motto is: “I stick stuff to other stuff and kid myself about the rest.”

q)What are some of your current projects?

a)To be honest, I’m currently in a bit of a lull at the moment. I’m having a bit of artist block. It happens to me quite often. I work in intense spurts and then have phases of little or no production. Not sure why the pattern is the way it is, but I accept it now and know that another manic episode of making will come along again.

q)Which of your works are you the most proud of? And why?

a)I’m generally always proud of my most recent works. In this case it is my “a higher education” series. I like to think the newest work builds on the work I’ve done before and is therefore more visually interesting and conceptually sophisticated than what came before it.

q)Are there any areas, techniques, mediums, projects in your field that you have yet to try?

a)I would like to work larger. I have made some attempts at this but, don’t feel those works were very successful.

q)What do you do to keep yourself motivated and avoid burn-out?

a)Again, my students always keep me on my toes and I also work with some fantastic artists in my department at the university. Both my students and my colleagues motivate me not only to make work but to make work that is as strong as theirs.

q)How do you spend most of your free time?

a)I spend much of my time with my dog, Lorelai and partner, Neil. I love Netflix and Hulu and am a huge fan of old movies, l especially love Hollywood films from the 30s and 40s. I’m a bit of a voyeur, I love to look. I also think my love of looking and observation has greatly informed my making.

q)What contemporary artists or developments in art interest you?

a)As I said I love looking so I’m into all kinds of art. Some contemporary artists work I’m really enamoured with are the paintings of both Neo Rauch and Robert Ryman and the sculptures of both Peter Christian Johnson and Devin Farrand. 

Also, as I mentioned earlier, there are hundreds of collage artists working right now who I greatly admire. A few of them would be Flore Kunst, Katrien De Blauwer, John Hundt, Eli Craven, Fred Free, Ross Carron, Anthony Zinonos, D.E. May…I could go on and on. It really is an exciting time for collage right now.

q)We really like some of your pictures, how can we get our hands on them? Do you sell them? How?

a)I do on occasion sell works, though I sure won’t be quitting my day job anytime soon. The best way for folks who see something of mine that they like is to contact me through my website corypeeke.com or through my social media. I am on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/CoryWPeeke/), Tumblr (http://cpeeke.tumblr.com/) and Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/cpeeke/).

Thank you and your readers for your interest in my work!