Duncan Regehr: Once Were Angels

Exhibition: May 15th – June 3rd, 2025

Opening Reception: May 15th from 5 pm to 8 pm

You are invited to join us at the opening reception on Thursday, May 15th. The artist will be in attendance.

–

The Petley Jones Gallery is pleased to announce a solo exhibition of the newest works by Duncan Regehr. Regehr’s work of the last thirty-five years in the visual, performing and literary arts has established him as a prolific multi-media artist of international prominence. In profound summarization, the artist speaks to the exhibition’s theme, “We are always on the path, always in a state of becoming.”

In his newest series, “Once Were Angels,” Regehr explores how change comes to us in many ways – manifested by fate, natural evolution, conscious decision, or the hatching of an idea. Transformation and divergent trajectories may occur quickly or over time. Our world is not the same and we are not the same as we once were.

The figures within this series are observed at the threshold of change, embarking on new paths of experience or awareness, engaging new ways of being. The end of one passage heralds the beginning of another.

The paintings are rendered with oil, acrylic, charcoal, graphite, resin, alkyd paint, wax pencil, beeswax and ink. Images are created on heavy hessian print paper, thoroughly saturated with acrylic polymer and sealed on wood panels. The underlying hessian print gives the paintings their weave-like quality. Hand-peppering of multiple tiny dots/dashes and the erasure or tempering of some create a pointillist aspect.

Once Were Angels is the fifth of five series that comprise “Odysseys” – a body of work that Regehr developed over the last nine years. “Odysseys” portrays destiny, with imagery focused on individual journeys and the interaction of human spirit with forces of fate and nature. Whether it is a journey of fate, a dream journey or a metaphysical journey subjects are on their way from one place to another.