Mr. Berning, a resident of Santa Fe since 1981, is a well known artist, author, teacher, and former gallery owner . His works have been exhibited in such diverse locations as San Francisco, Paris, and New York’s Lincoln Center. In 2005 his paintings became the focus of the film OFF THE MAP starring Joan Allen and Sam Elliott. Also in 2005 he began a year long journey up the west coast of North America. Experiences during this time became the foundation for his memoir about art, which was written over the next three years.
Evocative of the New Mexico landscape with its sweeping vistas and ever changing light, these most recent oil, egg tempera, and watercolor paintings are the result of a fifteen year process described in the entry “A Figurative Derivation”.
Artist Statement:
Being a painter, I was born in 1951 already an antique. After a lifetime of creating images in this post modern world I have come to champion no ism’s. Taking to heart my eighty year old friend’s reminder that his generation made sure everything had been done, I have proceeded to do everything in each painting. The resulting fifteen oil paintings, though inevitably stamped with my distinctive aesthetic voice, travel freely through various fields of contemporary exploration. Accepting that the act of working in paint will result in the echo of vaguely familiar imagery from past painters has released me from the tyrannical demand for newness and, ironically, opened the process to a multitude of possibilities embodied in each individual painting. If it has all been done before there is no territory worth defending. One either stands on shifting sands, or swims.
Many of the paintings completed in this series have sold making viewing of the remaining images difficult. This entry of only available work will update regularly.
All paintings are 18″ x 24″ on 24″ x 30″ paper unless otherwise noted.
Three Aspects
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View to the Lava Fields / San Felipe
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Lake View / Pedernal
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Winter Snow / Nambe Badlands
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Placer Spring
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Lake View
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Long View to Pajarito
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Sandia Blue / Long View
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Winter Tree Stand / La Melilla
12″ x 16″
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Mercurial Noon
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Treeline / Abiquiu
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Winter Range / From Santa Clara Pueblo
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Winter Storm / Black Mesa
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Placer Mountain Gray
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Dawn / Sun and Moon
12″ x 16″
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Storm Approach / Los Barrancos
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Autumn in a Halcyon Year
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Tree Line / View South / Abiquiu
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Winter / Cerro Bonanza
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Nambe Badlands West
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View to Truchas Peak from Santa Clara Pueblo
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View to the River / La Cienega
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12″ x 16″
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Blue Pedernal #2
12″ x 16″
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The View East / Espanola Valley
12″ x 16″
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To Dream of the Jemez
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The View West / Miami
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Bright Afternoon / Springer
Pedernal / View to the Lake #1
12″ x 16″
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Early Morning / Galisteo Basin
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View West to Soletta
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Ghosts / The White Place
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Cliffs at Otowi
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Bright Afternoon / Pedernal
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Morning / Black Mesa
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An Afternoon Clarified
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View to Caja de Rio Plateau
Summer Bosque / Road to Lyden
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White Cliffs / Abiquiu
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Summer Arroyo / San Felipe
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Lifting Storm Over Placer Mountain
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Afternoon Showers / Ghost Ranch
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Controlled Burn / El Rito
12″ x 16″
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Low Stratus / View to the North
12″ x 16″
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Sandia Blue
12″ x 16″
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Canyon Showers / Abiquiu
12″ x 16″
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A Glimpse of the River
12″ x 16″
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Winter Tree Stand / La Mesilla Three
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Long View to the Sandias
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Spring Fields / Abiquiu
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Canyon Showers
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From Paseo de la Cuma
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Last Snow
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The View North to La Bajada
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Road to Lyden / Gray Day
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Into The Valley
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Perfect Cloud
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View to the River / Between Storms
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Winter Shadow / Sierra Negra
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Winter Looking South / Galisteo Basin
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Behind the Tree / Sun
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Autumn / La Cienega
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The View South / Showers
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Summer Pasture / Abiquiu Inn
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Morning Overlook / Espanola Valley II
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Monsoon Summer / Midday
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Long View / St Peters Dome
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Dome Wilderness / South Gate
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The Ghosts of La Cienega
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Sandia Blue 18″ x 24″ 2021
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Long View to Pojoaque / Early Light 18″ x 24″ 2021
Thus far we have had a productive monsoon season with afternoon storms rolling in almost every afternoon. After last years arid smoke filled summer it is a relief. Many of these late season paintings have become about the monsoons.
All these images measure 18″ x 24″ on 24″ x 30″ paper.
Tetilla Peak From Bonanza Ranch
sold
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Storm Over The Sangre De Cristo Mountains
This was completed last month when spring storms had left the skies in a constant state of drama.
(sold)
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Spring Bosque / Road to Lyden
Another from this spring. The new-green in the trees had me aching for summer. Now summer is here with a heat wave. I stopped by this paint site yesterday and found this valley dense with foliage, green upon green upon green.
sold
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Long View to Pedernal
I’ve been trying to paint the distinctive Pedernal. O’Keeffe painted it many times and said “God told me once if I painted it enough, I could have it.” This is the first version I have felt comfortable enough with to mount and photograph.
sold
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The Ghosts of La Cienega
Nestled in sensuous hills south of Santa Fe is the village of La Cienega. In the early days wagon trains would stop at El Rancho de las Golondrinas (now a museum of sorts) to refresh themselves before the journey north to Santa Fe or south to Albuquerque. The roads, lined with ancient cottonwoods, have always felt a bit haunted to me thus, when this image appeared on my easil, the title.
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Minimal Horizon / Tetilla Peak
sold
These two paintings were done from Bonanza Ranch Road. I have spent a lot of time painting from this high point in the landscape which signals the transition between southern and northern New Mexico. Big views and multiple horizons.
Minimal Horizon / Cerrillos Hills
sold
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Foothills / Manzano Range 1
Meant to hang together (obviously) these two pieces were done from a high point on Waldo Canyon Road looking east to the Ortiz Range.
sold
Foothills / Manzano Range 2
sold
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Summer Bosque / Road to Lyden
The first painting of this place was in winter. I returned to capture it in the spring with its tree branches budding new-green. Here the trees of summer and humid warmth of the air lend a more sculptural feel to this scene, the whole image becoming less wild and more bucolic.
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Bridge to La Cienega
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Sandia Blue II
The only opaque area of this painting is the distant Sandia Range, which translates in the photo as the lightest and most airy portion of the image. Thus the title “Sandia Blue”.
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Long View to Pojoaque / Early Light
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Monsoon Summer / Jemez Range
This time of year clouds build over the Jemez Range, 20 miles to the west, then move east to rain on our city. This one became a big blow just as I was finishing. The evenings are cool from the fresh rains.
Being a painter, I was born in 1951 already an antique. After a lifetime of creating images in this post modern world I have come to champion no ism’s. Taking to heart my eighty year old friend’s reminder that his generation made sure everything had been done, I have proceeded to do everything in each painting. The resulting fifteen oil paintings, though inevitably stamped with my distinctive aesthetic voice, travel freely through various fields of contemporary exploration. Accepting that the act of working in paint will result in the echo of vaguely familiar imagery from past painters has released me from the tyrannical demand for newness and, ironically, opened the process to a multitude of possibilities embodied in each individual painting. If it has all been done before there is no territory worth defending. One either stands on shifting sands, or swims.
