Mateo Romero Biography

Contemporary Cochiti Pueblo painter Mateo Romero is an internationally known artist. He is the recipient of a prestigious 2016 Native Arts and Cultures award as a National Painting Fellow. Mateo attended Dartmouth College and studied with acclaimed artists Ben Frank Moss and Varujan Boghosian.

He received an MFA in printmaking from the University of New Mexico. Mateo is an award-winning artist who has exhibited internationally in Canada and in the United States. He is a former Dubin Fellow in painting at the School of American Research in Santa Fe, NM. In 2019 Romero received the Native treasures Living Treasures Award from the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He paints in his studio at the Poeh Cultural Center and lives in Pojoaque Pueblo with his wife, Melissa, and their children Erik, Povi, Rain and River.

Artist Statement

These paintings reflect a pattern of evolution and change. The images are powerful, imposing, juxtaposed with swirling gestural paint marks and drips. Timeless, archaic elements of Pueblo culture are juxtaposed with contemporary abstract expressionist palette knife and brush work. Overall, the paintings develop a rhythmic, hypnotic, trancelike feeling which is referential to the metaphysical space of the Pueblo and the dance itself.