top of page

Don Perley began his career as a self-taught artist in 1975. His early work focused on hard-edge acrylic paintings and small conceptual pieces. In the ‘90’s, Don transitioned into painted assemblages created with everyday objects and abstract oil paintings bursting with color. A Midwest native, since 2004 he has lived and worked in Stamford, Connecticut.

Don’s work has appeared often in group shows and juried competitions in Connecticut and New York, including The Peter Marcelle Project, Southampton, NY, and the BWAC Brooklyn Re-Cycle show.

Rhinebeck show cropped.jpg

These days I am just concerned with liberating color from the cruel tyranny of confinement in the tube!

SOLO SHOWS AND AWARDS

Solo show, Pleiades Gallery, NYC, 2022

97th Annual Juried Exhibition, Greenwich Art Society. D. H. Griswold award for best painting - “Mirage,” 2014

 

East End Arts, Riverhead, NY, 3rd Annual National Juried Art Competition - Best in Show, “Juju,” 2014, award and artist-in-residence

Solo show, Albert Shahinian Fine Art, Rhinebeck NY, 2014

Solo show, Albert Shahinian Fine Art, Poughkeepsie NY, 2004

Solo show, Schmidt/Dean Gallery, Philadelphia, 1991

Solo show, Momenta Art Alternatives, Philadelphia, 1989

SELECTIONS FROM JURIED COMPETITIONS

The Ridgefield Guild of Artists 43rd Annual Juried Show - “The Colorworks,” 2020

Flinn Gallery Juried Exhibition, Greenwich Art Society - “Forgotten Dreams,” 2016

98th Annual Juried Exhibition, Greenwich Art Society - “Rough Sketch,” 2015

SPECTRUM Exhibition, New Canaan Society for the Arts - “Wired,” 2018

ARTIST STATEMENT

Don Perley’s work is improvisational, layered and complex. Secrets are revealed slowly, both in oil painting and deep relief assemblage. He is immersed in the raw and rough. However, just as in the improvisations of nature seen from a hiking trail, the raw and rough, upon close observation, are also delicate, soothing and healing.

Don’s paintings push the eye from one passage to another on a journey of color juxtapositions, while exploiting the physical properties of paint and ink, pushing them to their limit. His assemblage pieces deform familiar raw materials, exposing their essence and possibilities.

 

Ultimately what Don creates are arenas and conditions for colors and materials to display their properties freely and combine

in unplanned and joyous ways. His intention is not so much the creation of art but more a search for spontaneous life springing out of improvisations in pure color. This is a fundamentally exuberant enterprise, and the artist sees it as direct painting, direct expression and direct communication.

bottom of page