Doug Auld

Doug Auld is an American portrait artist who lives and works in New Jersey.

Early Life and Education

Doug Auld grew up in New Jersey. His parents encouraged him, and his brother, to engage in lively debates at the dinner table. He attributes his coming of age in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s in the United States, being raised on Twilight Zone and Outer Limits, to his interest in UFOs.

Growing up, Auld was interested in science and mechanics and  liked to tinker and fix things around the house. He studied auto mechanics in a technical high school.

Auld taught himself to write music and became a keyboard player in a band when he was 16. After having to depend on other, often not so dependable, band members he decided to focus on something he could do alone.

A visit to his artist brother's studio, as well as a trip they took to the first Dali Museum in Ohio, inspired Auld to begin painting.

Career

Doug Auld paints in series. After graduating from school, he did a series of paintings of photorealistic tools and a series of surreal works, based on his interest in UFOs. He is also doing a series that he calls "Surreal Celebrity Portraits" that combine famous faces with a natural environment, like the ocean, to create what he calls, "visual chess."

In 2003, he painted a portraits of burn patients. He called the series  State of Grace. Auld said that the series was inspired by an incident that occurred about thirty years ago; Auld was at an outdoor market when a young girl with severe burns on her face walked through the market. Like most of the people in the market, Auld stared at her in "shock and disbelief." Embarrassed by his reaction, he thought often of the young girl. "I wanted to freeze-frame her," he said, "so that I could look, and process, and come out of it and say, 'Good morning.' “ Auld contacted the Burn Center at Saint Barnabas Medical Center in Livingston, New Jersey and proposed a series of portraits of burn patients.

The series was so successful that one of the portraits was chosen in a nationwide competition to hang in the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery in Washington and an interview with the artist was published in The New York Times.

Auld says his goal is to, "Combine creativity in my art in a little bit of a provocative and edgy way to enlighten people on certain topics."

His ongoing Whistleblower series are portraits of people who have come forward to address what they perceive as illicit or wrong. He focuses on those individuals who have brought forth information about UFOs and Extraterestrials. He has even written a musical called Hypnotta, about a young girl who witnesses a life changing UFO event while in grade school.