Paul Davies
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About
Central to Davies’ approach is the notion of painting as a site of memory. Architectural references, whether drawn from Observed environments or internalised impressions are translated into compositions that oscillate between the real and the imagined.
Paul Davies’ practice is grounded in an ongoing investigation of architecture and the built environment, from which he extracts a visual language of line, structure, and form. These elements operate in a space that is neither strictly representational nor wholly abstract; rather, they function as generative frameworks through which space is constructed, deconstructed, and reimagined. His paintings unfold through the accumulation and erosion of layered surfaces, where gestures are repeatedly applied, obscured, and revealed. This iterative process foregrounds temporality, positioning each work as both an image and an index of its own making.
Central to Davies’ approach is the notion of painting as a site of memory. Architectural references, whether drawn from Observed environments or internalised impressions are translated into compositions that oscillate between the real and the imagined. These works resist fixed interpretation. instead proposing spatial fields that are contingent and in continual flux. The layering of paint operates simultaneously as a formal strategy and conceptual device. personal histories within the material surface while withholding them from full resolution.
Davies’s work has been acquired by The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, the University Of California Irvine, Institute and Museum Of California Art, Scottsdale Museum Of Contemporary Art, Palm Springs Art Museum, Crocker Art Museum, MAK Center for Art and Architecture and the Laguna Art Museum. In 2016 he completed a residency at the Frank Lloyd Wright School Of Architecture Phoenix and work from this is now held in the permanent collection at the Scottsdale Museum Of Contemporary Art and McClelland Sculpture Park + Gallery- In 2013 he was awarded a residency at the Cite Internationale des Arts, Paris by the Art Gallery Of New South Wales. Davies was featured with Luc Tuymans and Peter Doig in the essay ‘Limbo Architecture - Painters Of Modernism’ by Aaron Betsky, director Of the Cincinnati Art Museum (2006-14), for the May 2014 edition Of Architecture Review.
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Exhibitions
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Off-site
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HOLUS BOLUS: SYDNEY CONTEMPOARY, 2026
HŌLUS-BŌLUS transformed an apartment in Surry Hills into an immersive exhibition exploring the collision of contemporary art, collectible design and domestic life.
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News
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Paul Davies
Laguna Art Museum California USAPaul Davies's ‘Landscape in Openplan' (2018) is currently on view at the Laguna Art Museum as part of the museum’s permanent collection display. Davies captures modernist architecture through curved forms,... -
Paul Davies
Palm Springs Art MuseumPaul Davies's painting ‘Built Landscape I’ is currently on view in the Desert Stories gallery at the Palm Springs Art Museum. This work was acquired by the museum in 2017...
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