Andrei Petrov

ANDERSON CONTEMPORARY

ANDREI PETROV

"When words are not enough, painting arrives. In contrast to traditional Abstract Expressionist work, which might start with a tree or a woman and proceed to abstract it, I do the opposite: I add nature to an abstract language that marries Hudson River School drama-filled light and grandeur with energetic animated gestures, muscular surfaces and bold strokes familiar in Abstract Expressionism. Numerous glazes and swaths of paint dash about the canvas stage and often emerge from the lower depths where the painting began. By freezing the action, I allow a slow motion probe of the components that comprise the composition.

Think of a frozen lake: leaves, twigs, nuts, fish, are all suspended in ice at random depths and angles. Thick islets of paint interrupt a placid color field to create a vast, non-linear perspective from the root to the fruit of the gesture. Tension is created by the juxstaposition of animated bursts of paint with the slow, contemplative layering found in the Hudson River School painting. At times, the brush is mightier than the pen."

NYC born and raised, Andrei Petrov has exhibited in New York, Washington D.C., Chicago, New Mexico, Boston and Florida. Petrov’s work can be found in the collections of The Cooper Hewitt Museum, The Four Seasons Hotel, The Fairmont Hotel, and the Segal Corporation, to name a few. He was selected as the honored Visual Artist at the esteemed Music@Menlo Festival in Silicon Valley, California.