VISUAL ARTS + MUSEUMS

Buchanan Gallery presents  Doug Sweet - A Solo Exhibition of recent acrylic paintings on canvas.  On view January 22 through March 5, 2011. Please join us Saturday for the first GalvestonArtWalk of  2011, featuring beautiful new work by Doug Sweet, one of our most highly collected artists!

For his seventh solo exhibition at Buchanan Gallery - with many appearances in gallery group shows in between - Doug presents a new body of paintings with fresh takes on favorite still-life themes such as flowers and fruit. Ever curious and playful in his subject matter, Doug also has new paintings depicting images as diverse as an ice cream cone and an olive at close-up range. As always, these new acrylic paintings capture the incredible color, light and realism that have made him a favorite with collectors over the years.

Doug will be present during the ArtWalk reception.

Now on display in our Main Gallery, the exhibition continues through March 5,

The Artist Writes: When I began to develop an interest in art my father would take me to the Denver Art Museum to view the traveling exhibits and the work in the museum's permanent collection. I was always attracted to the paintings done in the 16th and 17th century which dealt with realistic subject matter. I found these particularly appealing because of the artist's ability to create narrative aspects using paint. They were able to tell a story without using words.

It was not until I moved to Houston and saw a painting done by Jackson Pollock at the Houston Museum of Fine Art that I had any understanding of non-objective painting at all. The depth he achieved in that painting with drips and runs was incredible. It occurred to me that his work had things in common with realistic painters other than the way they applied paint to canvas and subject matter.

I enjoyed the entire process of making art. I am especially fascinated by the illusion that occurs when a piece is successful. It is like watching a separate form of reality evolve. An illusion of 3-dimensions on a 2-dimensional surface is of course not real at all, but created with paint or graphite on canvas or board. A representation of reality. This concept and the process of creating a finished painting or drawing is very abstract to me. The finished piece is magical to me.

Pictured:  detail Slots, 2009, Acrylic on Canvas.