Peter Doig

Book excerpt: Peter Doig is well known for the exotic atmospheres and dreamy narratives that appear in his work. With an uncommonly rich color palette and a unique material sensibility, he has created some of the most resonant and evocative images in contemporary painting, placing him among the most inventive painters working today. But, as this extensive volume makes clear, he is also a sophisticated visual thinker, endlessly preoccupied with the process and history of painting. No Foreign Lands is the first publication to examine in depth the conceptual underpinnings of Doig's oeuvre. Particular attention is given to the importance of motifs, themes and variations in his work, explored in over 200 paintings and works on paper from the past 13 years, among them new works never before published.Born in Edinburgh in 1959, Peter Doig was raised in Canada and spent two decades in London before moving to Trinidad, where he now lives and works. Doig graduated from St. Martin's School of Art in 1983 and the Chelsea School of Art in 1990. He was nominated for the Turner Prize in 1994, and was included in the 2006 Whitney Biennial. In February 2013, his painting "The Architect's Home in the Ravine" sold for $12,000,000 at a London auction. The exhibition No Foreign Lands, which opened at the Scottish National Gallery before traveling to the Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal, showcases works created during the past ten years, much of which the artist spent in Trinidad. The Independent called the exhibition "a thrilling show," and The Observer praised it as "mesmerizing."