Peggah Samaei was born and lived in Iran until she was 18 years until she moved to the UK, where she has lived ever since. As a child, Peggah took out drawing lessons privately and continued for three years, never missing a session. After moving with her family to the UK and realising how important art was to her, Peggah decided to study spatial and interior design at the University of the Arts, which allowed her to develop her practice further. After graduating and becoming a mother, Peggah experienced an awakening of mind, body and soul which allowed her to fully absorb the beauty of her surroundings with a deeper sense of awareness and stillness. With this sense of wonder and awe, Peggah's artwork focuses on what she is feeling and how she is communicating with the energy of her subjects.
1) Which art movement do you consider most influential on your practice?
Cubism, Impressionism and abstract art.
2) Where do you go and when to make your best art?
I go to my studio, a spacious loft room at my parent's place. I tend to draw my ideas and experience with colours after 5 pm on weekdays when I finish work. Then I set to work at my studio on the weekends where I spend long hours finishing my piece.
3) How do you describe your 'creative process'?
Exciting, meditative and surprising.
4) Which artist, living or deceased, is the greatest inspiration to you?
Blue Smith who is a living Canadian Artist Picasso among the deceased.
5) If you weren't an artist, what would you do?
I think I would have been a different person. I would have wanted to pursue a career in interior design or I would be having a progressive career in my current office job.
6) What do you listen to for inspiration?
Radio Smooth Chill.
7) If you could own one artwork, and money was no object, which piece would you acquire?
This work by Blu Smith:
8) If your dream museum or collection owner came calling, which would it be?
Saatchi Gallery in London or The museum of modern art in New York.
9) What is your key piece of advice for artists embarking on a fine art or creative degree today?
To use your degree as a platform but to rely on yourself from day one.
10) What is your favorite book of all time (fiction or non fiction)?
Has to be The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho.
11) If you could hang or place your artwork in one non traditional art setting, where would that be?
In a minimalist interior space of a modern architecture building for home or office like the New Cave house style architecture in Japan.
12) What was the biggest lesson your university course or time studying taught you?
To accept Diversity, be open to possibility and look at the world with open eyes and to trust my gut feeling.
13) And finally, if we were to fast forward 10 years, where would we find you?
Hopefully in a calm, warm beautiful spot in a world creating big art work and that I had launched a signature style in art.
Learn more about Peggah and discover her collection of artworks.
