Still Life 1930

Samuel Peploe made this ‘Still Life’ painting with oil on canvas, and it’s all about how colours get pushed around. You can see that he’s not trying to ‘copy’ these pots and apples in front of him, he’s trying to make a painting. Look at the way he handles the paint; it’s pretty straightforward. The colour is layered with a frank immediacy, as if he's working quickly, capturing a feeling rather than a precise image. See that dark bottle? It’s made up of tons of smaller strokes. There’s something about the confident way he’s throwing down colour that makes it sing. The whole thing feels kind of provisional, like it could be wiped away at any moment, and maybe that's the point. Like, art is always in progress. You can really see a similar approach in the work of someone like Bonnard, who, like Peploe, was so good at creating these intimate, domestic worlds with just a few brushstrokes.