York University
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Douglas Gibb Morton (1926–2004), known as Doug Morton, was a Canadian painter and a member of the Regina Five. Using bold shapes and bright colours, his work was committed to exploring how form and colour interact with one another. 

Born in Winnipeg, MB, he began his studies at the Winnipeg School of Art in 1946. Morton, however, did not have a traditional academic trajectory and he went on to study in the US, France, and England. He studied at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles from 1946 to 1948; the Académie Julien and L’École des Beaux-Arts in Paris in 1949; and the Camberwell School of Art in London from 1950 to 1951. Upon returning to Canada, he participated in the Emma Lake workshops affiliated with the University of Saskatchewan from 1965 to 1967, where he studied with Barnett Newman, John Ferren, and Clement Greenburg, among others. Morton worked as a commercial artist and a curator before becoming the manager at his family’s pipe distribution company from 1954 to 1967. This job allowed him to paint late at night and in the early morning while still supporting his family of six children. In 1967, he left the family business to pursue art and teaching full-time. He taught at the University of Saskatchewan’s Regina Campus, York University, and the University of Victoria. He became well known for his strong arts administration skills and his innovative approach to managing fine arts departments.

Morton’s monumental works experimented with their approach to colour, material, shape, and paint types. His exploration of these formal qualities connected him with the Regina Five, and he became a leader of abstract art in the prairies. Some of his experiments included affixing found materials, like wood or styrofoam, to his canvases to extend the picture plane, but more notably, he had a keen eye for colour and often investigated the way that colour and flat bold forms interact with one another. His process is defined by a combination of chance and deliberate choices. Morton would frequently rework his paintings as they developed, reconsidering his past decisions as unexpected formal relationships emerged.

His paintings have been exhibited throughout Canada. In 1961, his work was exhibited on the national stage when he was included in Five Painters from Regina at the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa. In 1994, the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria hosted a retrospective of his work. Additionally, his work can be found in the permanent collections of a number of significant institutions in Canada, including the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, the Remai Modern, Saskatoon, and the Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina, among many others.