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Douglas NewtonApples and Glass, super real, illustionistic, colorful contemporary still life2016
2016
About the Item
Oil paint on canvas
Doug Newton’s hyper-real paintings observe reality, explore translucency, reflections and luminosity, and dazzle the viewer with all the ways light can transform our perceptions. His subject matter concentrates on still lives of food, toys, candy and household objects.
In addition to many group shows across the country, Mr. Newton’s show, “HARD CANDY and other confections” represents his fifth solo exhibition. His paintings have been collected in numerous private collections.
Mr. Newton resides in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, NY.
Dr. Sonia Coman writes in her essay, Doug Newton’s hard candy: the confection of painting
Doug Newton’s paintings are about… painting.
The hyperrealist technique of trompe l’oeil or “trick the eye” is knowingly playful. It simultaneously calls attention to the illusion of a different material—for example, translucent candy wrappers—and the reality of the layers of paint, masterfully applied to the canvas. In that, Newton’s paintings pay homage to an esteemed series of trompe l’oeil masters, from Inquisition-era Spanish painter Francisco de Zurbarán to Gilded-Age American painter William Michael Harnett. But Newton adds something new to the genre. His paintings revel in the effortlessness of their illusionistic effect, celebrating the tension between the abstract quality of a brushstroke and the precise representational image it renders in the viewer’s eye.
The reflections we often see on Newton’s canvases heighten this unapologetic presence of multiple materialities—real, perceived, and imagined. Unlike shadows that extend across surfaces, the reflections of Newton’s depicted chocolates and ribbons sink into something resembling a mirror. This murky reflective surface is at odds with the angle and the opacity of the main surface, i.e. the painted canvas itself. The doubling of the depicted objects through these spectral, distorted reflections draws attention to the fact that painting, too, is a (subjective) reflection of some form of reality, be it everyday objects or less palpable things like the artist’s inner world.
Newton’s choice of candy and ribbons as privileged subject matter conjures up memories of childhood and notions of play, pleasure, and comfort. However, enlarged and decontextualized, Newton’s candy assumes a different, more serious dimension, inviting the viewer to turn the banal on its head. I find Newton’s paintings of confections akin to group portraits. To me, they provide a meditation on the nature of painting. “Confectionery” comes from the Latin “confectio,” which means “something made by putting together.” That stands true of candy as it does of painting. The effect on the consumer of a good piece of candy, like that of a good painting, is the result of an elaborate, multi-layered process—one that we’re invited to “unwrap” in our minds’ eyes as we enter Doug Newton’s realm of confection as painting.
- Creator:Douglas Newton (1938, American)
- Creation Year:2016
- Dimensions:Height: 14.02 in (35.6 cm)Width: 18 in (45.7 cm)Depth: 0.75 in (1.9 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:Brooklyn, NY
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU133915702771
Douglas Newton
Douglas Newton is a realist painter specializing in contemporary still life. He paints in oil on canvas and works directly from life, not using photographs. Douglas is noted for his colorful closeups of candy and their wrappers, capturing the reflections and transparency of the foils and cellophane. There is a pop-art influence in the paintings of candy. He also paints still lives of food, toys, dolls and anything else that is visually interesting and evokes memories. His paintings have the rich beauty of oil paint, instead of the dryness of photo realism. Douglas lives and works in Fort Greene, Brooklyn. His paintings can be seen by appointment there or on his website: douglasnewtonpaintings.com. His paintings have been in numerous one and group shows and are in many private collections.
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