Statement
My paintings investigate pain and difficult life situations through representation and allegory. My influences range form Frida Kahlo to contemporary painter Jammie Holmes. I work in a Surrealist style to explore questions and emotions that arise as I navigate life. While each work is a personal expression, my paintings allude to universal themes in hopes of resonating with a broad range of people.
I look at encyclopedias, folk art, scientific drawings, old sourcebooks, photographs and images I have collected. I actually started painting as a response to an unfortunate set of circumstances, when many rolls of film for a photo project I was working on were ruined in the processing phase. I took the very thin negatives and made washed out work prints, then painted those images with black and white oil paint on wood panels. This experience was the beginning of my love of painting.
Recent work is done more intuitively, though purposefully, using color to create mood and emotive qualities. I create work to heal, to help survive. Art elicits emotion and therefore can help us relate to one another. There is no more universal experience than pain. It transcends our socially contructed categories
CV
2024 Wisconsin Artists Biennial, Museum of Wisconsin Art, West Bend, Wisconsin
2023 Dreams and Nightmares, River Arts Gallery, Prairie Du Sac, Wisconsin
2023 Dubuque Museum of Art Biennial, Dubque Iowa
2023 Wisconsin Perspective, Thelma Sadoff Center For The Arts, Fond Du Lac, Wisconsin
2023 “ Beautiful Loser” Arts + Literature Lab, Madison Wisconsin
2022 Communication, Communication Art Center, Madison Wisconsin
2015 Bookless, Madison Public Library, Madison Wisconsin
2012 US Presidents Show, Overture Center of Arts, Madison Wisconsin
2018 Tory Folliard Gallery, Milwaukee Wisconsin
2007 James Watrous Gallery, U.S. Road Trip, Madison Wisconsin
About
Doug Fath has exhibited his art in galleries across the United States. He received his MFA in photography from University of Illinois Chicago in 1992. His BFA comimg from Columbia Collage in 1990. His work includes photography, drawing, and painting, though he focuses primarily on painting now.
He has sold work to collectors and has exhibited in galleries in both Chicago and Madison Wisconsin where he now resides..
PRESS
https://artlitlab.org/all-review/interview-with-doug-fath
https://isthmus.com/arts/anywhere-usa/ https://www.wisconsinacademy.org/gallery/us-road-trip-and-still
https://artlitlab.org/all-review/interview-with-doug-fath
www.artlitlab.org