Peter Doig's early paintings

Doig’s peripatetic life provides a backdrop for understanding his work. Born in Scotland in 1959, he moved frequently as a child—following his father’s job at a shipping company—from the United Kingdom to Trinidad to Canada, steps he has retraced over the course of his adulthood. Working steadily since the 1980s, he has devoted his career to depicting landscapes tinged with the history and memory of these places.

Made soon after Doig graduated from the Chelsea School of Art in London, Pink Snow (1991), like many of his works, features a solitary male figure. Here, the figure is situated within a mysterious wooded landscape that recalls the artist’s time in Canada. The painting’s jewel-like decorative surface—of snow and its atmospheric qualities—functions like a screen, a visual interference that troubles the viewer’s relationship to the depicted scene. “That is the way the eye looks,” Doig has reflected of these effects, “you are constantly looking through things, seeing the foreground and the background at the same time.”

What inspires Peter Doig?

Doig paints from photographic sources, such as his own pictures of landscapes, film stills, and images from newspapers and magazines. He does not seek to replicate these images in his paintings, instead, he uses them as a tool to create works that draw from both individual and collective memories of place. In 1994, Doig was nominated for the prestigious Turner Prize, launching him to fame in the international art community. His works, which depict scenes ranging from urban, rural, and wooded landscapes to artists’ studios and lone figures in fishing boats, concentrate on the illusionistic properties of paint. In his most recent works featuring scenes of Trinidad, Doig revisits one of his childhood homes; the artist now has a studio in Trinidad, and also teaches painting at the School of Art in Düsseldorf, Germany.

Where can I see Peter Doig Artworks?

Peter Doig's artworks are exhibited in various galleries and museums around the world. Some notable places where you can see his works include the Tate Modern and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City, and the Art Institute of Chicago. Additionally, his works are often featured in major art fairs and exhibitions globally.

How much do Peter Doig paintings cost?

In 2007, his painting White Canoe sold at Sotheby's for $11.3 million, then an auction record for a living European artist. In February 2013, his painting, The Architect's Home in the Ravine, sold for $12 million at a London auction. Art critic Jonathan Jones said about him: "Amid all the nonsense, impostors, rhetorical bullshit and sheer trash that pass for art in the 21st century, Doig is a jewel of genuine imagination, sincere work and humble creativity."