KUBAPARIS ATELIER Douglas Cantor

KUBAPARIS ATELIER presents artists and their ateliers from all over the globe. This time you will get a glimpse into the world of the painter Douglas Cantor.

Age: 34

Education: Camberwell College of Art

Current location: London, UK.

A work of yours that you particularly like and why?
My favourite work of mine is often the last one I’ve made as it still feels fresh and exciting but if you want me to choose one i’d say “La Casa” which is a painting of my grandparent’s living room in the house where I grew up as I remember it.

What is your favorite part of your job?
The lack of control, or giving up control, or maybe embracing the lack of control, i’m not sure which one best describes the feeling of letting go of what is in your head and just embracing what is happening in front of you, it’s kind of like the difference between adventuring and commuting.

What makes something worth making?
Curiosity i’d say, the possibility of what can be, and you will only able to find out after the job is done.

From which artist would you like to own a work?
I live surrounded by my partner Sophie Vallance’s work and most work i’d like to keep are by her, so I’m really lucky that way until the works leave the house/studio. But I like that too, having to let go, which makes me feel like I don’t think i’d like to own art, I like to admire it but not the idea of owning it.

Which art movement has inspired you the most so far?
Perhaps not an art movement, films and music are a much bigger influence in my practice. But if I force myself to answer I like painting that is not concerned with being pleasing but free and honest instead. From fauvism to naive to folk, to the work lots of our contemporaries are making that puts the process and the story before the concept and the aesthetics. I love a free, bold, honest painting but that is also the kind of thing I enjoy making myself so i’m biased I guess.

Instagram: @douglas.cantor
Courtesy: The Artist