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“I try to paint a glass in total restraint of any personal involvement, and without a flicker of emotion. Each one is a new one. In any observation of reality, no one ‘glass painting’ is exactly like the one before – similar to an industrial product – but original within a series – without uniqueness – without ‘stroke of genius.’”

– Peter Dreher, 1994

Quint Contemporary Art is pleased to announce the opening of Drawings and Paintings, Peter Dreher’s fifth solo exhibition at the gallery. There will be an opening reception for the artist on May 7, from 6 to 8 PM. The exhibition will feature two-dozen “Tag um Tag Guter Tag (Day by Day a Good Day)” paintings as well as a dozen “Vitrine” still-life paintings and a group of Dreher’s new flower drawings.

QUINT: Three Decades of Contemporary Art

at the California Center for the Arts, Escondido Museum

August 15 – December 31, 2009

Special preview Saturday, August 15th from 6 – 9PM

340 N. Escondido Blvd.
Escondido, CA 92025
www.artcenter.org

Cocktails, hors d’ oeuvres, entertainment & live music.
$10 per person for non-members, free to Center Members.

RSVP to (760) 839-4120

The California Center for the Arts, Escondido Museum is pleased to present Quint: Three Decades of Contemporary Art. The exhibition, based on the program of one of San Diego County’s most influential galleries, will open on August 15th and continue through December 31st, 2009. Works in the exhibition, the majority of which have been borrowed from Southern California museums and private collections, present an extraordinary survey of the range of regional, national, and international artists supported and promoted by Quint Gallery over nearly thirty years.

Since opening his first gallery in La Jolla in 1981, Mark Quint adopted a unique, almost nomadic approach to the business of contemporary art. Rather than establishing itself in a permanent location and then expanding over time, Quint Gallery would more often adapt its spaces and program according to the needs of the artists it was interested in presenting. From formal gallery and raw open spaces in downtown San Diego, to large industrial workspaces for artists near Miramar Naval Air Base, to unexpected (and often elegant) spaces secluded in back alleys in Hillcrest or La Jolla, Quint Gallery has maintained the flexibility to represent artists employing a wide variety of practices, mediums, and formats.

Since 1974, Peter Dreher has painted over 2,000 canvases in the “Tag um Tag guter Tag (Day by Day good Day)” series, showing an empty glass on a white table before a white background. Relations such as light, distances between glass, easel, lamp, and the eye of the painter are always the same. In the past 35 years no painting was corrected, painted twice, or taken out. “Day by Day good Day” is a Zen-Buddhist sentence stating that everything is of the same meaning or importance.

“I try to paint a glass in total restraint of any personal involvement, without a flicker of emotion, each one being new. In any observation of reality, no one painting is exactly like the one before, similar to an industrial product, but original within a series, without uniqueness, without “stoke of genius.” Concentrating on painting, by painting only one motif without changing it. Each painting is an interchangeable component of the mass. Developing itself like nature does as a tree: one leaf shows it type, three leaves show similarities and differences, one branch shows the result of a lifetime. It is not enough to just have the idea of painting 2,000 similar paintings, to express the idea of a project like “Day by Day good Day,” you must do it – and this project has no end.”
— Peter Dreher, 1994

In the book, Peter Dreher – Tag um Tag guter Tag published in 2008 in Germany, gallery owner Cai Wagner discusses his impressions of Dreher and his work:

“In my mind, this seemingly unique combination of Peter Dreher’s – a clear serial concept and a convincing painterly representation – differentiates his work from artists such as Opalka, On Kawara and Darboven; they rather push it in the direction of Morandi. This mixture makes Dreher’s work truly great, something which defies time modes and –isms.