The new paintings on view in New York include double portraits, twisted figures, and a large-scale still life with ripened quinces. By harnessing the lingering allure and historical resonance of old master drawings, he transforms their past imagery into something rich and strange. Wielding a broad knowledge of art history, literature, music, and popular culture, Brown creates images and forms in which divergent references collide and playfully coexist. Gagosian is pleased to present We’ll Keep On Dancing Till We Pay the Rent, an exhibition of new paintings, sculptures, and drawings by Glenn Brown. It is always about getting some internal understanding of reality out. Glenn Brown, Shallow Deaths, 2000, Image courtesy of the Artist and Gagosian Gallery.Art, to me, has never felt like a description of reality. This landmark exhibition will feature over 30 paintings, sculptures, and prints as well as a fully-illustrated catalog.

Where “high art” meets “low art,” we are reminded of the way the Old Masters of the 16th and 17th centuries developed a following across privilege and class. At the same time his work retains a crowd-pleasing popularity that swells beyond typical art world jurisdiction, speaking to “the simple pleasures of looking and the pre-linguistic pull of major, lasting art” which critic Martin Herbert highlights in his work. Artist and writer Lynn MacRitchie echoes the sentiments of critics and audiences when acclaiming his technical skills as “alegendary” – calling special attention to how Brown “can render the surface of paint on canvas as flat and smooth as a glossy magazine.” The relatively minimal number of paintings he makes per year, a clamoring coterie of buyers and soaring, multi-million dollar prices have made this artist the stuff of auction house majesty. His work resonates as a model for the longevity of painting by turning the icons of this tradition into the fodder for dark theatre. Painting steadily over the last three decades, Brown crafts paintings with an immaculate, almost supernatural level of detail and fluidity. This is the first solo museum exhibition in the United States to survey the work of renowned London-based artist Glenn Brown.

Curated by Organized by the Des Moines Art Center Curated by Jeff Fleming

Glenn brown website