'and to show you I'm not proud, you may shake hands with me!' 1970

Peter Blake made this quirky print, ‘and to show you I'm not proud, you may shake hands with me!’. It’s like he's collaging different realities together. I love how he's not afraid to let these worlds collide, which really speaks to his playful attitude to art making. The surface has a kind of dreamy texture, especially in that wall Humpty Dumpty is perched on. You can almost feel the rough, aged surface. And that egg head—it’s so bizarrely detailed, with every tooth in place! It is so juxtaposed with the almost flattened medieval city behind him, as though the artist is playfully challenging our notions of depth and space. It reminds me a bit of David Hockney's stage designs, that same pop sensibility mixed with a love for theatrical space. Blake shows us how art can be this ongoing conversation, full of quirks, and joyful experimentation.