Doug Frohman Df_1

Doug Frohman - Statement - "Yesternow" 2015

Utilizing the language of abstraction, my work draws upon an amalgam of minimalism, color-field and aspects of architecture. I tend to work thematically drawing upon a series of concepts while engaging with different materials, surface and themes.

Since 2007, I switched from painting with brushes to using cement trowels of different sizes, experimenting extensively with different mediums and painting on hard wood panels instead of stretched canvas. The thicker, richer volume of paint and its application via the trowels multiplied my options, suggesting new ways of creating and “treating” the surface.

From selectively-scraped passages revealing the work’s back-story and layered development to open fields of seductively smooth, glossy color, the added variety of paint handling and new surface treatments opened the way to more sophisticated and nuanced compositions.

My past three series have been based around the square. From the series of four sequential panels and squares in “Abstract Narratives”, to the boldly-colored, large geometric squares of “Equations” to the small, individual panels of “Particles”, the square and its combinations has remained a constant in the work.

Spatial architecture has emerged as a special focus in my current work. Re-conceiving the surface as a 3-D spherical space vs. a flat plane adds dimensionality to the relative position of the forms while increasing the dynamic tension they create.