City Lies Acrylic Painting On Paper
A sharply dressed man stands facing a large coiled snake positioned on the opposite side of the composition. Separating them is a tall central form resembling an ermine stole, creating a visual barrier between the two protagonists.
The man’s expression is calm and faintly self-satisfied. Rather than appearing intimidated by the snake, he seems quietly pleased to be confronting it. There is a suggestion that he has emerged from a difficult situation with his confidence intact and perhaps with a clearer understanding of the character before him.
Doug uses scale to reinforce this feeling. The foreground figures are enlarged and cropped, bringing the viewer uncomfortably close to the action, while the background characters remain detached and self-contained. The result is a scene that feels both public and strangely private.
The title, City Lies, provides the key to the painting. The work suggests a world where appearances cannot always be trusted and where truth is obscured beneath layers of presentation, rumour and self-interest.
As part of both the Divorce Series and the Metropolis Collection, the painting explores themes of distrust, uncertainty and hidden motives. The city becomes a stage populated by individuals who reveal only fragments of themselves, leaving the viewer to question what lies beneath the surface.
Doug leaves the narrative deliberately unresolved. The blonde woman’s watchful gaze may belong to someone uncovering a deception, or perhaps someone discovering that the truth was never quite what it seemed.
City Lies – Acrylic painting on paper from the late 1990s, part of the Divorce Series and Metropolis Collection by Doug Kemp.
