Material oil on canvas
Dimensions 61 × 76.5 cm
Status Vetted

About the Work

Vettriano, born in 1951 in the county of Fife, not far from Edinburgh, is a self-taught painter who came to the discovery of his talent relatively late. Raised until almost thirty in a poor household within a mining district stricken by the economic crises of the 1970s and ’80s, he was compelled to abandon his studies early in order to contribute to the family’s livelihood. At the age of twenty-one he was given a set of brushes, and began to train himself by copying the great Impressionist masters and, later, the leading figures of American Realism.

His rise to prominence began in 1988, when he took part in a group exhibition at the prestigious Royal Scottish Academy in Edinburgh, where his works sold on the very first day. From 1992 onwards he exhibited in major galleries across the world, capturing the interest of eminent collectors, among them the British Royal Family itself; in 2004, Queen Elizabeth II recognised him by admitting him to the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire.

"How do you stop?" dates from 1995 and was shown that same year in the artist’s solo exhibition at the Corrymella Scott Gallery in Newcastle upon Tyne. It is an exemplary canvas of Vettriano’s poetic: poised between popular culture and highly erudite references, Edward Hopper, certainly, but also the exponents of the existential Realism that flourished in Western Europe in the later twentieth century. The palpable failure of communication between the man, turned away and smoking, and the aloof woman refastening her garter, evidently after a clandestine encounter in what appears to be a motel room, recalls the masterworks of existentialist literature, evoking a kind of suspended time imbued with lyrical intensity.

There can be little doubt that Vettriano’s success, including his commercial appeal, signals how the return to figurative art may be seen as a way through the enduring crisis of the avant-gardes. In the subtle gestures of his figures, the painter inscribes his vision of human relations in an age marked by the denial of sentiment and, consequently, by a profound and visceral solitude.

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Provenance

Corrymella Scott Gallery, 1995
Private collection

Literature

Corrymella Scott, Jack Vettriano, A Date with Fate, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 1995, no. 7
A. Quinn, Jack Vettriano, 2006, p. 69
Jack Vettriano, Museo della Permanente, Milan, 25 November 2025 - 31 January 2026

View artwork at TEFAF Maastricht 2026

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