Peter Wowkowych is an artist, curator and architect living in Santa Monica, California.  Peter recently retired from his career as the campus architect at Sony Pictures Entertainment, Los Angeles, California where he worked for 30 years. He has been practicing and exhibiting his art since 2010. He now practices as a full time artist with an art studio near the Arts District in downtown Los Angeles.

 

Born and raised in upstate New York, Peter received his Bachelor of Architecture degree from the University of Notre Dame, including a year aboard, studying art and architecture in Rome, Italy. 

 

Early in his career, he was awarded an internship at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection Venice Italy, and two years later at the American Pavilion of the Venice Biennale. These two pivotal internships solidified his desire to explore creative endeavors in both art and architecture.

 

In the early 1990's Peter moved  to Los Angeles, California to pursue a Master of Architecture degree from the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI Arc).

 

In the early 2000s Peter spent time in the Himalayan mountains of Nepal. During this period, he co-founded a non-profit, Restoration Works International, where he and his team worked for 10 years to restore a 300-year old Tibetan Buddhist monastery aswell as restore the ancient Buddhist frescoes in this monastery. This 10-year project affected him deeply, working to restore the social and spiritual center of this remote Nepali community, and connecting with the ancient ways of story telling and communicating through painting wall frescos. The Himalayan mountains, the rooftop of the world, have long been a mythical spiritual place for Peter. 

 

Peter’s art practice focuses on exploring LGBTQ identity issues, how we craft our identity, as well as how we learn to connect with others through shared experiences. Peter explores the physical and psychological boundaries between people, the places we inhabit, and the dichotomy between the world we inhabit, and another world we wish to escape to. His focus is how people and places, shape who we become.