Menu
The New Contemporary Art Magazine

The Paintings of Glenn Brown

With his distinct thin brushstrokes in acrylics and Indian ink, Glenn Brown’s swirling portraits offer both art-historical reverence and his own distinctive sensibility. Elsewhere, in his work in oils have a particularly unsettling quality, the textured faces of his subjects melting into different hues.

With his distinct thin brushstrokes in acrylics and Indian ink, Glenn Brown’s swirling portraits offer both art-historical reverence and his own distinctive sensibility. Elsewhere, in his work in oils have a particularly unsettling quality, the textured faces of his subjects melting into different hues.

“He is known for the use of art historical references in his paintings,” Brown’s site says. “Starting with reproductions from other artist’s works, Brown transforms the appropriated image by changing its colour, position and size. His grotesque yet fascinating figures appear to be painted with thick impasto, but are actually executed through the application of thin, swirling brushstrokes which create the illusion of almost photographically flat surfaces. The effect is powerful–often unsettling–creating an artistic language that transcends time and pictorial conventions. Brown sees these appropriations and oppositions as key to his approach.”

See more of the artist’s work on his site.

Meta
Share
Facebook
Reddit
Pinterest
Email
Related Articles
The paintings of Moscow-born, Copenhagen-based artist Masha Gusova are not only in dialogue with art history, but also stir conversations within a single work. In creating these surreal convergences between scenes, the artist attempts make us "reassess the old patterns of thought that we are all subject to, and the need for us to allow them to shatter and be restructured throughout time.”
The practice of Jesse Draxler, who recently illustrated the cover of the new Daughters album, combines painting and photographic collage. Working primarily in grayscale, both the artist’s illustrative and fine art work are packed with harrowing portraits. The artist has also crafted work for the bands Vowws and Deafheaven.
Casey Weldon crafts surreal, sometimes absurd paintings that play with the everyday and the otherworldly alike. The artist, based in Washington, D.C., is featured in a new show at Thinkspace Gallery in Los Angeles. “Sentimental Deprivation” continues the thread of that duality in the artist’s work. The show starts June 3 and runs through June 24.
Robots battle in a world that seems simultaneously prehistoric and futuristic in Rob Sato's watercolors. The artist (first featured in HF Vol. 16) defies the limitations of his medium both in content and in format. While watercolor paintings are typically kept small, he works at mural scale, rendering the precise outlines of his giant robots, warriors on horseback and bizarre humanoid characters. The softness of the watercolor is still there, adding a handmade touch to his mechanical subject matter. Sato's latest exhibition "Curses" opens on September 20 at Martha Otero Gallery in LA and features several massive works, folded paintings that become sculptural objects, some simplified sketches and painted baseballs that seem to take their cue from the cave walls of Lascaux. Take a look at our preview below.

Subscribe to the Hi-Fructose Mailing List