GLENNBROWN(b. 1966)The Real Thing.Signed, titled and dated "Glenn Brown. 'The Real Thing' 2000" on the reverse. Oil on wooden panel.32 x 26 in. (81.3 x 66 cm).Executed in 2000.Provenance
Acquired directly from the Artist;
Patrick Painter, Inc., Santa MonicaExhibited
London, Serpentine Gallery, Glenn Brown, September 14-November 7, 2004
London, Hayward Gallery, April 4, 2000-January 28, 2001
Edinburgh, April 7-June 4, 2000;
Southhampton, June 23-August 20, 2000
Cardiff, September 8-November 5, 2000
Birmingham, November 24, 2000-January 28, 2001
London, The Tate Gallery, Turner Prize, October 25, 2000-January 14, 2001Literature
A.M. Gingeras, R. Steiner, Glenn Brown, London 2004, pp. 55 and 106Glenn Brown's oils on canvas appear thickly worked, almost sculptural; each stroke of his brush seemingly loaded with heavy paint. Upon closer inspection however, Brown's painstaking technique of nearly imperceptible brushwork creates ultra-slick surfaces in a witty play on scale and color, in a manner that is very often reverential. Aiming towards a personalized iconography, Brown mines art history to choose visual quotations from artists such as Jean-Honoré Fragonard, Rembrandt, Frank Auerbach, Karel Appel, to Salvador Dali. With his meticulously sleek painted surfaces, Brown creates a three-dimensional effect using the tiniest of brush strokes in such a way that his subjects become almost secondary. Brown then subverts the source images from upon which he draws inspiration, transforming them into paintings that are both hauntingly familiar and, completely new. In his paintings, such as The Real Thing—the title being an homage to the Eurythmics' song "The Walk" ("All I want is the real thing/nothing but the real thing")— Brown essentially explores the nature of paint itself, its possibilities and the way it is used to form art. Deliberately challenging the way the viewer reads it on the canvas, Brown forces his audience to alter their traditional approaches to the medium by subverting the way it is created.

Brown deftly mixes fine art and popular culture to create paintings and sculptures of baffling complexity and sheer painterly beauty. His lengthy process of working from reproductions reflects how often the viewer experiences art at second-hand, through photographs. Brown deliberately further twists these images by creating reproductions that are not always faithful to the original in color or tone, and then cropping or otherwise manipulating the images. 'I re-enliven it into something completely different. Something that makes personal allusions to my own life.' In essence, Browns work engages the notions of reproduction and originality. Unlike the studied imitations of old masters common to 18th Century painting that offered tribute, Brown's brand of deconstruction, engages the viewer in a slow and studied reading of the painting, which demands reflection upon the process of painting itself. Moreover, following in the traditions of the great originators of Appropriation Art, such as Raymond Pettibone, Elaine Sturtevant and Richard Prince, over the last ten years Brown has brought a new technical mastery and conceptual animation to the movement. While the term 'appropriation' is continually used in reference to his body of work, it is inadequate to solely describe the intricacies of Brown's work with this term. Brown subjects all that he borrows to a complex series of modifications, additions and distortions, all of which create complex and beautiful works of art that each attain a fantastic life of their own.