jila peacock - the hafez calligraphy jila peacock paintings
jila peacock in her studio lion
  • British Book Design Awards 2006
British Book Design Awards 2006

Jila Peacock

Jila Peacock was born in Iran, and studied and practiced Medicine in London before graduating in painting from St Martin's School of Art in 1984. Although primarily a painter and printmaker, she has always had a great interest in music and the performing arts and worked as Artistic Director for ENO's Baylis Programme from 1989 to 1992.

Moving to Glasgow in 1990, she has been a part-time lecturer in the Glasgow School of Art and a member of the Glasgow Print Studio while continuing to exhibit regularly in London at the Piano Nobile Gallery.

Her interest in Contemporary music culminated in a major collaberation with Scottish based composer Sally Beamish, in a multimedia performance of an Anglo-Saxon poem 'The Seafarer', at the Alderton Music Festival in Suffolk in September 2000.

In 2003/4 she was a Visiting Scholar at Cambridge New Hall, with an award from the Arts and Humanities Research Board, to make a hand printed edition of a book of ten shape poems from the Sufi mystic poet, Hafez, of Shiraz.

The book went on to be displayed in a major exhibition at the British Museum, Word into Art from May-August 2006. A second book Ten Poems from Hafez based on the work from the original hand made version, published in May 2006, won the British Book Design Award for literature in November 2006.

An animation film made entirely with calligraphy from the shape poems, commissioned by C4, was premiered at the London Film Festival in October 2007.

Jila Peacock continues to practice medicine under her maiden name Djallilah Pezeshgi, and has been a medical member of Disability Appeal Tribunals in Glasgow since 1993.

Solo Exhibitions

  • 1987 Salisbury Playhouse Gallery, Salisbury, Wiltshire
  • 1988 Holland Gallery, London
  • 1989 Holland Gallery, London
  • 1990 Hambledon Gallery, Blandford Forum, Dorset
  • 1991 Holland Gallery, London
  • 1992 Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh
  • 1993 Holland Gallery, London
  • 1994 Lillie Gallery, Milngavie
  • 1996 MacRobert Gallery, Stirling
  • 1996 Glasgow Print Studio
  • 1996 Piano Nobile, London 'Jila Peacock's Other Worlds'
  • 1998 Loft Gallery, Glasgow
  • 1998 Piano Nobile, London 'Silent Opera'
  • 2000 Newhall College, Cambridge 'Deep Water'
  • 2004 Newhall Collage, Cambridge '10 Poems from Hafez'
  • 2005 Brunei Gallery, SOAS, London
  • 2005 Glasgow Print Studio 'Ten Poems from Hafez'
  • 2007 University of Exeter (Dept. of Arab and Islamic Studies)
  • 2007 Leeds College of Music (Leeds Lieder Festival)

Selected Group Shows

  • 1987 Beaux Art Gallery, Bath
  • 1990 Berkley Square Gallery, London
  • 1991 Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh
  • 1991 Oxford Gallery, Oxford
  • 1992 Roger Bilcliffe Gallery, Glasgow
  • 1993 Paperworks, Seagate Gallery, Dundee
  • 1993 John Hughson Gallery, Glasgow
  • 1996 Glasgow Print Studio
  • 1996 Crossreference, Contemporary Scottish Printmakers (touring)
  • 1997 Paula Bennet Gallery, Denver, Colorado, USA
  • 2004 Glasgow Print Studio SOLAS
  • 2004 Agnew's, London (New Hall Collection Show)
  • 2005 Crossley gallery Dean Clough, Halifax (8th International Contemporary Artist's Book Fair)
  • 2005 Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge (Special Exhibit Book Case)
  • 2006 British Museum 'Word into Art' (17 May - 4 August).

Next shows

  • 2008 The Bodleian Library

Publications

  • A World of Folk Tales, edited by Sue Stewart. Scottish Cultural Press 1996
  • Jila Peacock's Other Worlds, Prof. Ludmilla Jordanova, University of East Anglia. Piano Nobile Publications 1996
  • Silent Opera. Paintings by Jila Peacock. Piano Nobile Publications 1998
  • The Seafarer. Translated from the Anglo-Saxon by Charles H. Wallace Illustrated by Jila Peacock. 1999.
  • Ten Poems from Hafez by Jila Peacock. Published in Glasgow August 2004
  • New version of Ten Poems from Hafez by Jila Peacock. Published by Sylpheditions.com editions May 2006

Collections

  • Paintings in Hospital, Scotland
  • New Hall collection of British Women's Art
  • The FitzWilliam Museum, Cambridge
  • National Museum of Scotland
  • National Library of Scotland
  • The Mitchell Library, University of Glasgow
  • The British Museum. London
  • Sackler Museum, Harvard University, Boston
  • The Bodleian Library, Oxford

Awards

  • 2003-04 Arts and Humanities Research Board (A.H.R.B), Department of Oriental Studies, Cambridge University
  • 2006 Winner of British Book Design award (Literature)
  • 2006 Channel 4/Arts Council "ANIMATE!" Major Commision for making animation Tongue of the Hidden