Doug Lowe, alias Dougart, is a painter. This is a short biography.
From his earliest years in South Africa where he was born in 1938, Doug has been fascinated by the inner workings of the mind and how it affects how we look. Reading people and interpreting their moods and feelings into paintings is central to his work. His African roots, he believes, have given him an acute and wild sense of colour which is quickly obvious in viewing his work.
Doug started painting in his late teens. His early paintings were all abstract but now in his mature years, whilst still enjoying producing abstract interpretations of the world, he finds representational works more challenging.
In his early 20’s he ran out of inspiration and into the reality that he had to eat to live and to support a wife and family. This led him into the textile industry where he and his wife formed a company developing fabric designs for the curtain trade and although he wasn’t actually painting he was refining his thinking all the while in preparation for the resumption of his work. In 1993 he started painting again.
Now his work mainly in acrylics on both board and canvas took a new direction, focusing on very colourful but realistic portraits or impressions of people and events. Progressively his work has become tighter, more precise and as in the case of the socio-political works very powerful.
The opportunity to explore raw emotion through a collaboration with his daughter in painting over 50 portrait interpretations over a period of 3 years, has resulted in a monumental project entitled "The Truth Behind The Mask" which was exhibited At stockport Art Gallery in 2003
Doug is exceptionally skilled at painting portraits of family, animals or friends from photographs. He also paints landscapes, flowers, abstractions and 3D paintings. His medium is acrylic paint and he works on both canvas and plywood.
He is also registered as Dougart in Wikepedia