These pages celebrate what it means to be alive…ecstatic, hilarious, challenging, painful, intense or sublime…it is the stuff of myth and legend as we experience it in our ordinary lives. These pictures are my attempt to see the numinosity of this experience. I would like to thank the extra-ordinary people who have made this work with me.
I was born in New York City in 1954 and moved to Ireland in 1966. In Trinity College, Dublin I studied English Literature and History. I developed an abiding love for both and have since come to see these as an essential part of my artistic training. The words of poetry and drama required inner visualisation. History gave me a sense of the bigger picture. For the remainder of my 20s I worked in printing and publishing. I began painting full time in 1985, making three dimensional work in 1989 and photo-based work in 1998. In the last decade, I have spent much of my time swopping stories with the people I photograph. We try to realize common symbolic elements in our shared inner landscapes. The images often have a mythic quality to them. This is because I believe we should see our lives as epic adventures, our struggles as heroic.
For me the creative process is more like movie making than stills photography. For each full day photoshoot there is a month of preparation and post-production: developing concepts, scripting, costume making, finding locations and props, the shoot itself and finally editing. Many of the people that I photograph participate in several aspects of this creative process. I also involve other creative people in the making of this work, particularly in the post-production work. Over the years I have collaborated with my son Aaron Lennon Ross on editing and since 2012 he has been co-editing work with me frequently.
“The men and women in Doug Ross’s pieces have flawlessly porcelaneous skin and bodies too beautiful to cover in anything more than veils, sarongs and loin cloths. Always solemn in expression and often in reverently elegant poses, they are holy beings reminiscent of the Madonna, druid priestesses, nymphs, and Biblical queens. Holiness and physical beauty seem intertwined to the point where one might go so far as to say that the subjects are beautiful because they are holy or holy because they are beautiful.”
-Eugene Hwang, reviewing my work at the Ico Gallery, New York City.
RECENT NEWS
Collaborators: Eight shoots with Lavina Maxwell from June 2021 through August 2022. Five full days with Eibhlis Ni Ghradaigh 2021-23, four days with Sigrife in 2022 -23 (with two planned for 2024), six days with Tara Liggett 2021-23 , two days with Rebecca Tun in 2022, two days with Keira Lavelle in 2023. All these shoots were exceptionally creative and productive. 2021 – 2024: Participated in exhibitions in New York City, Treviso (x2), Figeac (France), Paris and Ballinamore, Leitrim. “The Call” , a book I produced in collaboration with Elisabeth Svanholmer in 2020 finally got its first public presentation (on-line conference) at the World Voice Hearing Congress in September 2021 and first physical presentation at the Critical Voice Network Ireland Annual Conference in UCC in November 2022 along with 16 prints and a workshop.(On sale here: https://www.blurb.com/b/10159585-the-call , and some discounted copies available directly from me for €40 plus postage.)”The Spirit of Beauty” a book of images with Lucy Holmes was published in March 2021 and was finally launched in June 2022. (On sale here: https://www.blurb.com/b/10639779-the-spirit-of-beauty and a few discounted copies available directly from me at €60 plus postage) Twelve image feature in ION Magazine with Lavina Maxwell in January 2022 issue : https://ion-magazine.com/issue-41/ , and 16 image feature with Eibhlis Ni Ghradaigh in January 2024 issue. Continued quarterly feature in NyghtVision magazine: https://nyghtvision.com/ . Unfortunately the Los Angeles Center for Digital Art, where I had exhibited regularly for many years closed its doors in 2020.
2024: I have resumed making tangible art: painting, sculpture and mixed media. I will continue making photographic art for the forseeable future.