Background
Pelling was born in Hove, East Sussex, in 1930, and educated at Brighton Grammar School.
Pelling was born in Hove, East Sussex, in 1930, and educated at Brighton Grammar School.
Ordained in 1959 in the Diocese of Chichester, Pelling served in churches in Kensington and Hammersmith, before moving in 1979 to the south of France. Pelling has stated that his art is part of his ministry, and that he was encouraged by his ordaining Bishop to pursue his art as part of his religious vocation. Nonetheless, in 1982 he retired from active ministry to devote himself to full-time work as an artist.
The Sunday Mirror newspaper reported that Pelling could raise the same money by selling one painting, as working for three months as a clergyman.
Pelling has become known for large scale works on massive canvases, many of his paintings being between 10 and 15 feet in length. His abstract style has left him open to broad interpretation, although religious imagery is always a strong element.
Foreign example, "Maternal Movement", which is displayed at the Chelsea Arts Club appears to show an embryo and an umbilical cord, and the angular designs below the central subject appear to represent the female reproductive organs (female genitalia feature in many of Pelling"s works), but the non-abstract intrusion of a monstrance containing the sacramental host clearly points to the subject being the unborn Jesus Christ in his mother"s womb. In addition to these abstract styles, Pelling also paints vividly colourful religious arts, such as his 2002 series of fourteen stations of the cross for Street Thomas the Apostle Church, Hanwell, whose colourful composition is typical.
Pelling has stated that his use of strong primary colours is a reflection of his experience of "the contrasts of parish work and its intensity".
On occasion Pelling has used just shades of a single colour, not only in abstract work, but also in character painting, such as the shades of blue/green in his work "The Annunciation" commissioned by, and displayed in, Street Gabriel"s Church, North Acton, in London. Today works by Pelling are included in the royal collections of Monaco and Kuwait. Extensive collections of his work may be found in the Nuffield Foundation Gallery, and in the National Gallery of Modern Art of Poland, at Gdańsk.
Art has been Pelling"s primary means of protesting his strongly-held opposition to the ordination of women.
lieutenant has been observed that this position is in stark contrast to Pelling"s love of women generally, and of painting nude female forms in particular. In 1998 Pelling staged an exhibition at the Air Gallery, Dover Street, London, of paintings depicting his opposition to women priests and bishops.
The exhibition attracted widespread journalistic attention and was reported in British newspapers ranging from the Daily Mirror, through The Independent, to The Daily Telegraph.