The Contemporary Art of Peter Doig

            Peter Doig is the artist & painter from Scotland origin, and he was born in United Kingdom in 1959. He has been moving along various destinations with his family due to job of his father. In 1962, they relocated to Trinidad, and in 1966, they relocated to Canada. In year 1979, Doig went to London for his studies and did his MA in 1990 from Chelsea College of Art and Design. Since year 2002, Doig has been living as well as working in Trinidad. He is one of the renowned living painters of the world in recent times. His art work truly shows the colors of contemporary art with so much focus on figures as well as landscapes. He has been making great contributions to art work with his great paintings, which he wanted to look more than the photos, which people see everywhere (Artnet.com 2018). It is important to look at his paintings and his work in contemporary art to see that how significant he has been in modern times, and how well he has made the art of painting more attractive in the era, where technology has been the only dominating factor.

Analysis of Peter Doig’s Art Work

            The art of painting in modern times has been kept alive by the painters like Peter Doig, who has reinserted the lyricism, narrative, as well as magic in the modern paintings. If anyone should be given credit for returning contemporary art back to the painting, then Peter Doig name would in top of the list. Doig has used his own sense of colors and scheme of ideas to show things in different aspects. His work in the landscape painting is a phenomenal one in so many ways like he uses a color combination, which has not been common used in paintings. His color combinations are not only disquieting, but they are also uneasy. He has used a great composition of things from his own life experiences along with the ideas from the external world to create magical paintings. There are various key ideas in his contemporary art work, which are crucial to be reviewed in detail to understand that how his contemporary work has been different from the past or what relations it has with the past (Theartstory.org 2018)

        One of the key ideas always found in the contemporary artwork of Doig is the presence of human figures in any shape although they may be hidden or obscured in the image due to the environment. He also doesn’t believe in putting a split between abstract and figurative paintings. The other great thing about his paintings is the use of color in an effective manner. His paintings come with colors, which are more significant and bold. In addition to that Doig tries to show magical realism in his paintings. He does not make paintings with just one aspect; rather he uses a composition of different sources such as art, literary and film along with his own personal experiences from his life, which allows him to develop magical paintings with so many ideas at one place (Theartstory.org 2018)

        The other interesting thing about Doig’s paintings is that he relates things with reality. He tries to convert images and photographs into great paintings with mixing some ideas in his mind. He always tries to explain some mythical stories through his paintings. In 1987, Doig got back home in the night, and saw his younger sister, watching a horror movie. The name of the movie was “Friday the 13^th”. The scene which he was able to observe was related to a young girl, who was the only survivors in this series of murders story, and she was alone in a canoe. This scene stuck in his mind, and he thought to make a painting of this scene with his own approach. Then he made the painting of that young girl and came up with a series of paintings with the name of “Friday the 13^th”. It shows that how Peter Doig used different real life events, pictures or film to make his collection of amazing paintings (Tomkins 2017).

        From mesmerizing collection of landscape paintings of Peter Doig; one is called the Milky Way. It is mentioned earlier that landscape paintings are one of the major part of his contemporary art work. The Milky Way painting is such a great depiction of contemporary art, because it comes with so much colors and ideas of night in one painting, which shows the amazing paintings skills of Peter Doig. This painting is very much reflection of the art work, which has been shown in the past. The painting footprint for Milky Way can be found in the Western Art in 1609, which was one of the 1^st painting made from oil. The night sky reflection with stars and their view in the water seems so much beautiful and follows the artistic tradition, which has been followed in the past as well. Perhaps, Peter Doig is trying to depict in his painting that this is how humans see the sky from their view. It means that they don’t see millions of stars of Milky Way; rather they just see few stars due to various environmental factors (Phaidon 2017)

        Peter Doig has been making paintings, which are interesting and somewhat mysterious as well. Some of the poisonings are giving a clear meaning, and some of the paintings come with hidden messages for people to understand. Two Trees painting of Peter Doig was made in 201, and it is so amazing artwork in so many ways. It is a glorious piece of artwork depicting different aspects of life. One of the figures in the Two Trees painting is a hockey player. He got the idea from seeing the hockey players of a team in city of New York. The other man is looking downwards in the painting, whereas third person is holding the camera in his hand. The third figure in the painting is showing that whatever the situation is in the society, there are people who don’t try to help others in any emergency or disaster, rather they just make film on their camera. It is such a wonderful message conveyed by Peter Doig (Jones 2017)

        Looking at these examples from his art work, it is very much evident that Peter Doig do not believe much in conceptual art, and he has own style of depicting the events and stories through his mysterious and interesting artwork, which sometimes relates to the past, and it is very much living in the age of contemporary art. It is important to listen something from his own words that what he feels about his work and the things, which he has been depicting through his art work. In the modern age, where painting has become almost irrelevant in the contemporary art and there are not too many people taking interest in it, peter Doig is doing with so much passion and dedication (Hudson 2013)

        In one of his interviews, Peter Doig said that “I’m just one of those people who don’t feel they’re from anywhere,”. Actually he is referring to the fact that he belongs to different destinations as he lived his life in UK, Canada, and Trinidad. It can be said this thing is quite evident in my work as well, where he has tried to paint different ideas with different locations. He also said during his interview that “I always wanted to make paintings that told stories and suggested things.” His words show his idea of doing painting, which is different from others, and it can be clearly seen in his art work. But this success journey was not a quick one for Peter Doig, rather he had to work so hard to get painting at this stage, where he has become a renowned painter around the world, and keep delivering the great contemporary artwork, reminding the great past of the art and painting (Hudson 2013)

Conclusion of Peter Doig’s Art Work

        It can be said that modern technology and so many other distractions have dim the light of art work like paintings. The people are not too eager to get into this field, and there are not many to admire it unluckily. But when artists like Peter Doig are there, the contemporary art of paintings cannot die or fade away. He has kept this art alive with his great work, and there is so much to like about him. He has never hesitated to work hard in this field regardless of positive or negative responses. His passion, commitment and dedication has made him one of the best painters in the world in recent times, and the way he is doing his work, it can be said that his future is still bright. He has used so many concepts the old and new ones in his paintings, which have taken the attention of viewers. Moreover, it is important to mention here that along with personal success, Doig’s work remains to be critical for the field of painting. He uses different set of ideas and colors to show real events as well as mysterious events of life.

References of Peter Doig’s Art Work

Artnet.com. 2018. Peter Doig. Accessed November 4, 2018. http://www.artnet.com/artists/peter-doig/.

Hudson, Mark. 2013. Peter Doig interview: the triumph of painting. Accessed November 4, 2018. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/10216288/Peter-Doig-interview-the-triumph-of-painting.html.

Jones, Jonathan. 2017. Peter Doig review – sun, sea and savagery in a troubled paradise. Accessed November 4, 2018. https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/dec/18/peter-doig-review-michael-werner-gallery-london.

Phaidon. 2017. How Peter Doig saw the night sky. Accessed November 4, 2018. https://uk.phaidon.com/agenda/art/articles/2017/october/19/how-peter-doig-saw-the-night-sky/.

Theartstory.org. 2018. Peter Doig: Scottish Painter. Accessed November 4, 2018. https://www.theartstory.org/artist-doig-peter.htm.

Tomkins, Calvin. 2017. The Mythical Stories in Peter Doig’s Paintings. Accessed November 4, 2018. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/12/11/the-mythical-stories-in-peter-doigs-paintings.