Celia Paul: My Studio

‘My Chair is a self-portrait, really.’ — Celia Paul

‘I’ve been here since 1982. This is a painting of one of two identical chairs that were given to me by my dearest friends Angus Cook and Jonathan Caplan who live in New York. My studio is in the room next to the one where I sleep. One chair is in the corner of my studio where my models always sit. The other one (this one) is next to my bed – I usually rest my alarm clock on it. My Chair is a self-portrait, really .’

‘I am on a level with the figures on the frieze on the front of the pediment of the British Museum. The little figures in the forecourt look as tiny as ants, in comparison.’ — Celia Paul

‘There’s a little balcony (about the size of a small table) leading off from my kitchen. It faces south and is a real sun trap. I sit on my balcony with a cup of tea during breaks from painting and look at the spire of St George’s, Bloomsbury over the roof-tops and watch the antics of the pigeons.’ — Celia Paul

‘When I wake up, the first things I see from my bed are these huge figures of the Muses carved into the triangular summit of the pediment.’ — Celia Paul

‘There’s a beautiful plane tree right outside my window. Behind it, and to the left of the British Museum, the BT Tower rises up like a strange totem pole.’ — Celia Paul

‘Everyone has to rely on the internet and the telephone as never before; I haven’t seen anyone, apart from supermarket staff, for over two months. I Skype with my son and his wife and my four year old granddaughter and one year old grandson every day. I speak on the phone to my husband twice a day and Zoom with my four sisters every Saturday. The BT Tower is a sort of life-line.’

‘The BT Tower is a sort of life-line.’ — Celia Paul

‘I am inspired by the visionary legacy of the place.’ — Celia Paul

‘When the full moon floats in the sky, facing south, it makes me think of romantic sea voyages. I think of Shelley, who spent his last night in England in a house in Great Russell Street, before setting off for Italy where he was to die so young. I think of other spirits who have lived nearby: W.B.Yeats, Virginia Woolf, Charlotte Mew, William Blake, Vilhelm Hammershøi, Gwen John, Walter Sickert. I am inspired by the visionary legacy of the place.’

About the artist

Born in 1959 in Trivandrum, India, Celia Paul lives and works in London. Recent solo exhibitions include Celia Paul, curated by Hilton Als (Pulitzer Prize-winning author, staff writer and theatre critic for The New Yorker and associate professor of writing at Columbia University), which originated at the Yale Centre for British Art in 2018 and subsequently toured to The Huntington; and Desdemona for Celia by Hilton, at the Gallery Met, New York (2015–16). Paul’s paintings were also included in All Too Human: Bacon, Freud and a Century of Painting Life at Tate Britain, 2018.

Last year, Jonathan Cape published the artist’s memoir, Self-Portrait, to great critical acclaim. New York Review Books will publish the US edition in November 2020. Many of the quotes featured here are drawn from the chapter My Studio. Paul has recently finished working with filmmaker Jake Auberbach on a documentary about her life.