In Santa Fe Painter Peter Burega’s latest oeuvre, he brings his signature high-energy, abstract vision to a subject dear to his heart: the New Mexico landscape. Burega is intrigued by evidence of human presence against the backdrop of nature at its most powerful, and he has traveled the state photographing scenes that reveal the soul of New Mexico culture and history---an old grocery store set along a lonely road, beyond which tower majestic 12,000 foot peaks, or weathered adobe homes and outbuildings amid meadows of breathtaking beauty. “I’m interested in the intersection of human- made structures and nature, in the places New Mexicans choose to make their homes,” he says.

While the landscape is his departure point, Burega uses his paints to distill the scenic elements he photographs down to their minimal essence, infusing them with a dynamism that radiates so vividly that the literal details are unnecessary and the abstraction becomes a kind of vortex that draws the viewer in. He imposes a grid to give the paintings a framework to contain the restless energy he expresses, which creates a tension within the panels that seems to shift the images and shapes as you watch.

Formerly a concert pianist, a corporate lawyer, and a television producer, Burega now focuses his seemingly limitless creativity solely on painting, and his growing body of work attests to his command of his newest medium. Neither metaphorical nor literal, but rather a fusion of the two, these paintings also fuse the subtle and the dramatic in a uniquely personal expression that taps into the universal as well.

For Additional Information Contact:
Nancy Hunter
505.984.2111
hunterkirkland@earthlink.net

Visit the Hunter Kirkland website for more information on this exhibition