Peter Richards: I’ve been making art my whole life, but not really sharing it a lot. In college I started out as a geology major, did that for a couple years, but it wasn’t really working out for me. So I took a semester to adjust and went back as an art student. I graduated from MSU with my studio art degree and started doing freelance design work. The more I’ve lived, the more art-related stuff has impacted me.

SN: When did you realize your love for art was the career choice for you?

PR: It was slightly after (college). I don’t think I ever took it seriously before then. I’ve never really sold a lot of art, but I have a nice collection in the corner of my room.

SN: How did you get involved with (SCENE) Metrospace?

PR: It was older than my involvement, and it was created in response to the governor’s Cool Cities Initiatives. I showed up here about a year ago and interviewed for the position.

SN: What do you do on a daily basis?

PR: We put out a steady stream of press releases, we schedule events, we rent space and sort of loosely coordinate things with the exhibits, but not really.

SN: What are your ties with East Lansing?

PR: I was born in Traverse City, moved to East Lansing in 1992. I went to school, graduated and kind of stuck around. I like the community. I still have a lot of family around Michigan.

SN: What materials do you use when you paint?

PR: I usually use acrylics and different types of texture mediums that you can purchase to do sculptural things, and I’ve also embraced design work. Some of it’s straight computer stuff, and some of it is more artistic.

SN: What are some of your influences in your painting?

PR: I really like ’40s and ’50s abstract expressionist, especially Clyfford Still. His work has been out of the public eye, but they’re opening a museum dedicated to him in Denver in 2010, and I’ve already decided I’m going.

SN: How much do you charge for your paintings?

PR: Pricing is really weird. I sell some stuff online that’s just painted on chunks of plywood, and that’s like $20-$50 depending on how complex it is. Bigger things that are on canvas I usually kind of hit a ballpark figure of how much time I think I spent on them and then triple that, so it pays for itself. I can’t say I sold a lot of paintings, but I’ve sold more than van Gogh. He sold one.