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Peter Alexander Paintings

American, 1939-2020

A bit of surfboard wax, a small Dixie cup and the sun sparked an epiphany for artist Peter Alexander and began his rise through the Light and Space movement of the 1960s. After seeing wax dry into a translucent block, Alexander chose resin as his signature medium and created sculptures that appear to be constructed out of light itself.

Alexander was born in 1939 in Los Angeles. By 1966, he had studied under Estonian-born American architect Louis Kahn at the University of Pennsylvania and transferred to several universities before graduating with a bachelor’s and master's degree in fine art from UCLA. He explored the possibilities of resin throughout the 1960s. Many of his resin sculptures are monolithic and contemplative, with a mysterious air, as seen in his Cloud Boxes, which seem to trap miniature clouds within blocks. 

Like his Light and Space contemporaries James Turrell, Larry Bell, Mary Corse and DeWain Valentine, Alexander wished to capture light in the form of an artistic environment. After exhibiting at Nicholas Wilder Gallery in Los Angeles and the Robert Elkon Gallery in New York, Alexander turned to painting, drawing, lithography and polaroid photography as new ways to explore the effects of light. In his sculptures, the color changed in tone and intensity based on the light source and the position of the viewer. In his later work, Alexander’s curiosity about color informed much of his art, which combined light and hues to elicit various emotions.

He died in 2020 at the age of 81. Alexander’s art has appeared in films including Erin Brockovich, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines and Shopgirl. The Museum of Modern Art and Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the San Diego Museum of Art, the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Centre Pompidou in Paris have all exhibited his work. 

On 1stDibs, find a collection of Peter Alexander’s prints and multiples.

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Artist: Peter Alexander
Untitled #45
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

2010s Abstract Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Paper, Gouache

Untitled #48
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

2010s Abstract Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Paper, Gouache

Rosarito
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

1980s Minimalist Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil, Acrylic

Punta Gringa
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

1980s Minimalist Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Wax, Oil

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I am interested in drawing and collaging multiple layers of information that refer abstractly to maps, architectural drawings and blueprints or patterns and structures found in such things as roller coasters, power lines and fences. I use gouache and collaged paper in a series of layers that are a visual and ideological response to the previous layer to define my pictorial space. For each piece I create a set of rules to follow about the use of a limited palette, a grid format, opacity of paper and whether a piece may include curving lines or maintain a rectilinear structure. Artist CV: EDUCATION Master of Fine Arts in Painting Bard College 1986 Bachelor of Science in Art History State University College at New Paltz 1977 Additional Study: New York Studio School (Drawing Marathons) Columbia University, School of Architecture Women’s Studio Workshop TEACHING Professor of Studio Art, Department of Art and Art History, Marist College, Poughkeepsie, NY Coordinator, Interior Design Program, Florence, Italy campus 1992-present AWARDS NYFA Fellowship in Painting 2018 Invitational Award for Outstanding Contemporary Talent, University of Bridgeport, CT 2000 Purchase Prize, “11th National Juried Exhibition” College of Notre Dame of Maryland, Baltimore 1999 First Prize, “Women in the Visual Arts ‘95” Erector Square Gallery, New Haven, CT 1995 Joseph A. Cain Memorial Purchase Award for Sculpture Del Mar College, Corpus Christi, TX 1994 Honorable Mention, “National Juried Exhibition” University of Bridgeport, CT 1993 Individual Artists Fellowship in Sculpture Dutchess Arts Fund 1992/93 Tallix, Morris, Singer Internship in Sculpture Tallix Foundry, Beacon, NY 1990/91 MEMBERSHIP Royal British Society of Sculptors SELECTED JURIED/INVITATIONAL EXHIBITIONS 2020 “edu: Art Faculty of the Hudson Valley”, Hudson Valley MOCA, Peekskill, NY 2019 “Contemporary Abstraction”, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson, NY “Mixed Media”, SITE Gallery, Brooklyn, NY 2018 “JuxtaPositions”, The Painting Center, New York, NY “Peculiar Rarities”, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson, NY 2017 “Interlock: Color and Contrast in Abstraction”, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson, NY “Donise English: Encaustics”, Catskill Art Society, Livingston Manor, NY 2016 “Let’s Stay in Touch”, Howard County Center for the Arts, Ellicott City, MD “Under, Over, After Over”, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY 2015 “Off the Grid”, Arts & Culture Program, Albany International Airport, Albany, NY “Gridspace”, KMOCA, Kingston, NY “Abstraction”, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson, NY “Assuming Identity”, NY Institute of Technology, New York, NY 2013 “Modern Artists”, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson, NY “Artists of the Mohawk-Hudson Region”, The Hyde Collection, Glens Falls, NY Stone Canoe/Community Folk Art Center, Syracuse, NY 2012 New York Institute of Technology, New York, NY “Contemporary Painters (Who Just Happen To Be Women)”, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson, NY “Strange Glue: Collage at 100”, Cambridge School, Weston, MA “Dear Mother Nature”, Dorsky Museum, SUNY New Paltz, NY “Fresher Paint”, Rockland Center for the Arts, Nyack, NY Courthouse Gallery, Lake George Arts Project, Lake George, NY 2011 “Process+Content: Donise English”, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY “Donise English-Paintings”,Orange County Community College, Newburgh, NY “Gender Matters/Matters of Gender”, Freedman Gallery, Albright College, Reading, PA 2010 Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson, NY “Encaustics: Wax and Image”, Westchester Community College, White Plains, NY “Dots, Lines and Figures”, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson, NY “Spring Awakening”, NY Institute of Technology, New York, NY “Clay City Dreams”, NY Institute of Technology, New York, NY “Texture,Pattern, Fragment”, Krause Gallery, Moses Brown School, Providence, RI 2009 “Collage”, NY Institute of Technology, New York, NY “Working in Wax”, Bedford Gallery, Walnut Creek, CA “Encaustic 2009”, College of New Rochelle, NY “Three Artists”, Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson, NY “Convergence: The Human Experience”,Howard County Center for the Arts, MD 2008 “Suckers and Biters: Love, Lollipops, and Exquisite Corpse” Chashama Gallery, New York, NY Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson NY 2007 “Patterns and Light”, Blue Hill Gallery, Blue Hill, ME “Suckers and Biters”, AG Gallery, Brooklyn, NY 2006 “100 Artists, 100 Watercolors”, Jeannie Freilich Fine Art, New York, NY “On/Of Paper”,Kirkland Art Center, Clinton, NY “The Love Show”, Manchester Community College, Manchester, CT 2005 The Soap Factory, Minneapolis, MN “Small Tales”, Valdosta State University, Georgia National Juried Exhibition,Art Institute and Gallery Salisbury, MD, Juror: Stephen Haller “Greed, Envy, Jealousy, Fear”, TSL Warehouse, Hudson, NY 2004 “Women in the Middle: Borders, Barriers, Intersections” University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee “Girl Art Now”,Hera Gallery, Wakefield, RI 3 Person Exhibition, Monterey Peninsula College, Monterey, CA “The Feminine Eye”, Bradley University, Peoria, IL “Women Painting Women”, McNeese State University, Lake Charles, LA “Thought Patterns”, Kent Place Gallery, Summit, NJ “Surface, Matter and Artifice”, Dutchess Community College Art Gallery Poughkeepsie, NY 2003 “Beefcake/Cheesecake”,Orange County Center for Contemporary Art, Santa Ana, CA,Juror: Jamie Wilson, Curator Halpert Bienniel, Appalachian State University, Boone, NC Juror: Jeff Fleming, Senior Curator, Des Moines Art Center “The Great White Oak”, Garrison Art Center, Garrison, NY Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson, NY 2002 “Cat Calls”, Red Clay Arts, Brooklyn “Hudson Valley Regional”, SUNY New Paltz Juror: Sydney Jenkins, Director, Ramapo College Art Galleries 2001 One-Person Exhibition, Davis and Hall Gallery, Hudson, NY “Beyond the Surface”, Womanmade Gallery, Chicago One-Person Exhibition, Garrison Art Center, Garrison, NY 2000 “Vision 2000...
Category

2010s Abstract Geometric Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Gouache, Archival Paper, Color Pencil, Graphite

Previously Available Items
Sunset (April 27, 73)
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

1970s Minimalist Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Paper, Pastel

Untitled
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

2010s Abstract Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Paper, Mixed Media

Combo #35
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

2010s Abstract Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Paper, Oil, Acrylic

Combo #35
H 15.25 in W 18.25 in D 2 in
Fun Zone II
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

2010s Contemporary Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Oil, Board

Beverly Hills
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

1990s Contemporary Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil, Acrylic

Sun Land
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

1990s Contemporary Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil, Acrylic

Newhall
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

1990s Contemporary Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil, Acrylic

Newhall
Newhall
H 60 in W 66 in D 1.5 in
Franny Frizzle
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

1990s Contemporary Peter Alexander Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Acrylic

4/20/14 (Red Puff)
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Among the pioneering California-based Light and Space artists, Peter Alexander has spent the course of his career focusing intensely on light and its manifold effects in his sculptur...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Minimalist Peter Alexander Paintings

3/16/13 (Puff)
By Peter Alexander, 1939
Located in Laguna Beach, CA
Urethane
Category

Peter Alexander Paintings

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