Alan Douglas Ray
Toronto, ON, Canada
Website: alandouglasray.com
Facebook: alandouglasrayfineartstudio
Instagram: alandouglasray
Art Medium: figurative painting, drawing, portraits
"The Message", 16" x 12", oil on panel
"Gift of Light", 16" x 12", oil on panel
"The Card Sharp", 20" x 16", oil on panel
"Egg", 16" x 12", oil on panel
"The Retelling of Jaws", 20" x 16", oil on panel
"Shark Attack!", 16" x 12", oil on panel
"Teddy's Rescue", 20" x 16", oil on panel
"Minding the Egg", 16" x 12", oil on panel
Alan Douglas Ray is an academy-trained, traditional oil painter with a passion for portraiture, figures, still life, and landscapes.
His paintings tend to depict quiet, private places with an air of mystery and intrigue. He describes his style as classical realism, a form of representational art that exhibits a preference for order, beauty, harmony and completeness, and the representation of nature based on direct observation using traditional methods. Alan counts the Dutch Old Masters among his major influences, as well as Sargent, Sorolla and Zorn.
Born in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada in 1965, he enjoyed careers as an academic in international relations and as an entrepreneur in corporate training before following his dream to be a professional artist. Alan studied traditional drawing and painting at Toronto's Academy of Realist Art, graduating in 2013. In recent years, he's taken workshops with acclaimed Canadian artists Robert Bateman, Barry McCarthy, Juan Martinez, Matthew Mancini, Ryan Gauvin, and Roumen Kirinkov. He's also studied advanced techniques in colour mixing under American master Graydon Parrish, classical portraiture with Teresa Oaxaca, red chalk figure drawing with Robert Liberace, and imaginative landscapes with Donald Jurney. Alan regularly attends the conferences of the Portrait Society of America and the Figurative Art Convention and Exhibition.
He now works full-time as an artist from his studios in Toronto and Haliburton, Ontario.
Alan is an elected member and director of the Society of Canadian Artists (SCA), and an elected member of the Ontario Society of Artists (OSA) and the Oil Painters of America (OPA). He is also an Active status member of the Federation of Canadian Artists (FCA), and founder and president of the chapter called FCA Toronto. For oil painters who want to learn more about traditional oil painting practices and techniques, as well as the best practices from a conservation standpoint, Alan publishes an online resource centre called traditionaloilpainting.com