A formal sense of geometry, precise composition and unique tonal quality typify Peter Boggs’ landscapes, street scenes and still life paintings.  The deceptively simple landscapes capture the emptiness and vacant qualities of once bustling towns in southwestern Victoria while evoking the universal sense of place.  The total absence of human figures adds an ethereal quality to these austere scenes, and our attention is drawn to the precise structural composition, carefully observed shadow and pale light.  This strategy also coerces the viewer into an engagement with what is not shown, the implication of a reality separate from that which we initially see.  Apart from recording scenes as an observer, Peter aims to explore the ideas of constancy and change which he sees in the landscape.  A similar arcane impersonality and muted palette are evident in Peter’s paintings of simple table settings, viewed from above, where the critical placement of objects gently subvert still life traditions with a shift toward the abstract.

Born in New Zealand, Peter studied at Elam School of Fine Arts, University of Auckland, and taught painting and drawing in England and Spain before moving to Australia in 1987.  He has held over thirty solo exhibitions in New Zealand and Australia, and was a finalist in both McMillan Ford Art Award and the Fleurieu Biennale, South Australia.  In 1998, he won the Tattersall’s Club Landscape Art Prize.  Peter’s work is represented in various collections including Parliament House, Canberra; Kedumba Drawing Collection, NSW; News Limited; Tattersall’s Club, Brisbane; Telstra; NZ Education Board; Auckland City Art Gallery, New Zealand and the Ross Perot Collection, Texas, USA.