DOUGLAS GALLOWAY


DOUGLAS GALLOWAY

Texas artist, Douglas Galloway, practiced art even as a small child. He began private lessons at age 8 and was an instructor himself by age 18. Douglas attended Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas where he pursued a degree in Graphic Design, then changed his study to Studio Art. In the mind 1980s he moved to San Antonio, Texas where he immersed himself in the Latino culture, finding himself intoxicated by the festivals, the spirituality of the depth of family devotion that would become the vivid colors of the paint that brushed across his canvas. He moved to New Orleans, Louisiana, where he was drawn by the enchantment born from the mysticism of the old South and Creole legends that layered beautifully over all of his work. Douglas left there only to realize later that the galleries and artists that had helped shape his vision were swept away by the waters of Hurricane Katrina. This was a devastating loss that resulted in his walking away from his art to explore his own spirituality. For ten years, he searched inwardly through experiences that led him to chanting with Buddhist leaders, lighting lanterns with Hindu spiritualists, singing and dancing with Sufi, and studying in silence with Gnostic Christians. It wasn’t until he realized his dying father’s wish that he return to his art that he picked up his brush again. He returned to San Antonio, the place that he had felt most alive, and began to celebrate those things in his life that he had held most dear. He began his art again with a cleared eyed wisdom and renewed purpose. Douglas invites the viewer to glimpse into his experiences in spirituality and the people that have shaped his journey as it is defined through paper and paint. They are enveloped in beeswax that, like his life, yields a spectral opaque dimension, encaustic by nature and abstract in presentation; as he reveals his love family, his influence by place, and the strength of his determination to explore and document through art.