Every element in an exhibition of work by Peter Liversidge begins at the artist’s kitchen table with Liversidge sitting alone writing proposals on an old manual typewriter. These hand-typed pages, present an array of possible and impossible ideas for performances and artworks in almost every conceivable medium. In a sense the first realisation of every work is in Liversidge’s head, then on the page, then in the mind of the reader, and finally (perhaps) as a physical object or happening. In every case, the first ‘artwork’ from any series of proposals is the bookwork that presents the collected ideas.
As Liversidge has said: “… the process is also about the notion of creativity: it’s important that some of the proposals are actually realised, but no more so than the others that remain only as text on a piece of A4 paper. In a sense they are all possible and the bookwork that collates the proposals allows the reader to curate their own show, and because of its size and scale the bookwork allows an individual to interact with each of the proposals on their own terms, one to one”.
Major solo exhibitions of Liversidge's work have been presented in the UK, Europe and America, including: East Quay, Watchet; The MAC, Belfast; Bonniers Konsthall, Stockholm, The Aldrich Museum, Connecticut; The Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh and Tate, Liverpool.
His work has been included in recent exhibitions at The National Gallery of Art, Washington and The Whitechapel Gallery, London. Commissions have recently included a public artwork for the Edinburgh Art Festival: Flags for Edinburgh and OUT/EXIT for Jupiter Artland, Edinburgh. Liversidge has collaborated with the group LOW, creating videos, backdrops and album covers for their past three albums, Ones and Sixes, 2015, Double Negative, 2018, and HEY WHAT, 2021. In 2016 Liversidge was artist in residence for TedXCoutauldInstitute programme and in June of the same year The Bridge, a unique cycle of songs was written by Liversidge to celebrate the opening of the new Tate Modern, and was performed by a choir of several hundred people in the Turbine Hall.