Mosaic, Second Saturday ARTwalk: Anita Peghini-Räber Gallery embraces dance as art form

Anita Peghini-Räber, local U.S.-Swiss naturalistic-expressionist painter, is reaching out to dance as an art form.

Peghini-Räber’s newest, vibrantly colored, pastel paintings with powerful directional strokes encompass the joyfulness of dancing.  Her interest in depicting energy led her into painting dancers.

"Anita paints movement faster than a camera," a collector once said. Peghini-Räber's paintings refuse to hold still; there is no single moment recorded in her images. “Art is communication. It is wonderful to express a visual note of the non-verbal communication between dancers," says Peghini-Räber.

“Dancing is a very healthy expressive art form that needs to be taken more seriously nowadays, since our modern day culture demands that we stay in touch with people electronically, but rarely physically,“ Peghini-Räber said. Her edgy, elegant art gallery is hosting monthly Milongas called "Tango DE Arte" offering free introduction lessons in Argentine Tango taught by Alyssa Findlay from Tango Lewes. “Tango DE Arte transforms the dancers and the art gallery into an enchanting adventure,” said Anita Peghini-Räber.

Guests of the gallery venture out equipped with flashlights to find and enjoy art. Candlelight makes the original beach cottage with its dark wooden floors shine while bringing out the smiles of dancers floating by. The gallery draws tango dancers locally and from the large metropolitan cities surrounding Rehoboth Beach.

Anita Peghini-Räber shows her art and represents a dozen of the best regional artists in her upscale art gallery.  “Peghini-Räber's dynamic and expressionistic paintings are anything but simplistic or pandering. They are undeniably beautiful to look at, but ultimately all the more so because it is often a more difficult beauty, a mitigated beauty, an informed beauty, even an existential beauty”, says Patrick Cribben, local independent filmmaker, photographer and critic.

Peghini-Räber also shares constructive and fun critiquing for a fee. On Fridays 3 to 5 p.m. artists may bring in unfinished paintings; they will be energized to complete their work with joy. Pre-registration is required. The Peghini-Räber Gallery is located on 49 Baltimore Ave. open daily from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. Mosaic, Second Saturday ARTwalk, is Saturday, June 8, 6-9 p.m.