MALA BREUER | MYSTIC SOUTHWEST

April 30 – May 25
Opening Reception: Saturday, May 4, 1-3 p.m.
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Mala Breuer grew up attending classes in painting and drawing from a young age at the California College of Arts and Crafts. After high school, she attended the San Francisco Art Institute where she studied under many notable artists, including Richard Diebenkorn, Clyfford Still, David Park, and Mark Rothko. Breuer matured as an artist in, and was profoundly affected by, the era of Abstract Expressionism, focusing more on material and application than representation. By the late 1960s, she was pouring water-thinned washes of acrylic paint onto large, stretched and wet, vertical canvases. During an exhibition of those works, a San Francisco gallerist suggested that she head to New York where abstraction, minimalism, and conceptual art were continuing to gain traction. Breuer listened to this advice and set out to New York with intentions of staying only one year; she stayed for eight. In New York, she began working with a palette knife, making direct, abstract marks with dark colors and with great density. She gained recognition as a significant painter during her time there.

In 1984, Breuer moved to northern New Mexico, a landscape that influenced her use of color, light, and more minimal compositions. She painted for another twenty-plus years in the southwestern desert until her death in 2017. 

Breuer exhibited internationally and alongside notable contemporaries including Franz Kline, Willem de Kooning, and Agnes Martin. Her work is included in the collections of the Buffalo AKG Art Museum, NY; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Museum of Fine Arts in Santa Fe, NM; Albuquerque Museum, NM; and Capital Group in Los Angeles, CA.

Join us for an opening reception on Saturday, May 4th, from 1-3 p.m. to experience a curated selection of works from Breuer’s accomplished career.