international painting annual 1 exhibition-in-print
online resource






Elena Peteva
Oak Park, IL

Dominican University, Assistant Professor

page 133



statement

My work is an allegorical representation of our contemporary individual and social states.  What interests me most is our human duality and multi-faceted nature.  I seek to capture the coexistence of vulnerability and power, uncertainty and conviction, depravity and elevation in one and the same individual and/or society.  The figure or object in my images functions as an allegorical vehicle–a subtle but charged signifier for a suggested yet ultimately open-ended meaning.  The outer becomes emblematic of the inner, whether the outer representation reveals my subject‚s inner state and dissonance or my subject acts as a personification of an idea.  The iconography, formal decisions, and drawing and painting processes are closely intertwined to create subtle, incomplete signs with cognitive, sensual and emotive power intended to draw in the viewer and invite her or his attempt for interpretation.

This painting is a part of a larger series of drawings and paintings, titled "Empire."  

 

bio

born: 1978, Sofia, Bulgaria


education:

Syracuse University, MFA in Painting, 2007
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, 4-year Academy Degree in Painting, 2004
Interlochen Arts Academy, high school diploma - Painting and Printmaking, 1997


selected awards/honors

Purchase Prize of the Permanent Collection of the Fellowship of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, 2009
Saltonstall Foundation Summer Art Colony Fellowship, 2006
3 Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation grants, 2005, 2000 and 1997
Shaffer Fellowship in Fine Arts, School of Art and Design, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY, 2005


selected publications

2010 Contemporary Realism Biennial, exhibition catalogue, Fort Wayne Museum of Art, 2010
PAUSE: Contemporary Still Life, exhibition catalogue, Manifest Creative Research Gallery and Drawing Center, volume 40
Exhibition Review, Newhall, Edith. "Galleries: Irresistible Search for Clues Linking Students and Teachers, The Inquirer, July 5, 2009
2008 Biennial: Contemporary American Realism, exhibition catalogue, Fort Wayne Museum of Art, p.89, 2008



selected solo or two-person exhibits

Elena Peteva and Brett Eberhardt, Artists‚ House Gallery, Philadelphia, PA, 2009  
Elena Peteva and Brett Eberhardt, Artists‚ House Gallery, Philadelphia, PA, 2008
Elena Peteva, Artists‚ House Gallery, Philadelphia, PA, 2007
Elena Peteva, Artists‚ House Gallery, Philadelphia, PA, 2006



selected group shows

2010 Contemporary Realism Biennial, Fort Wayne Museum of Art, Fort Wayne, IN, 2010
Head First, MANIFEST Creative Research Gallery and Drawing Center,  Cincinnati, OH, 2010
2009 PAFA Alumni Invitational - Legacies: Works by Twelve Former Students of  Elizabeth Osborne and Sidney Goodman, Museum of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA, 2009
Drawing from Perception VI, National Biennial Juried Exhibition, The Robert and Elaine Stein Galleries at Wright State University, Dayton, OH, 2009



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