Contemporary Surrealism

This paper was written in April of 2018.

America, 2004 by Glenn Brown

With this piece I enjoy the use of brush stroke Brown created throughout the human figure, but the background does not resemble that same effect, which brings the man out to your attention. He takes an original concept and depicts it in a way that is unconventional but still holds roots to classical portraitist. Brown creates new work but yet still shows imagery of art history’s past, by creating impressionistic paintings.

Contemporary Surrealism

The theme of my show is the Abstract of Contemporary Surrealism, which is a casual classification for contemporary artworks informed in different ways by Surrealism, especially its interest in the irrational, automatism, the unconscious, madness, the grotesque, and the fantastical depiction of reality. This style of craftsmanship creates works that draw upon psychoanalysis, free-association, dreams, and the unconscious (Artsy). The motivation behind psychoanalytic therapy is to release bottled-up emotions and experiences, in different terms, make the oblivious cognizant. This idea was crossed with a disciplinary development which lasted from 1924 to about 1945 where the root of Surrealism began spanning though paintings, sculptures, photography, even poetry and film were impacted. Surrealism is an adjective for dreamlike, which can be interpreted into qualities such as unusual landscapes and distorted objects. This perceives a dreamlike characteristic that associates with surrealism or unreal qualities (Artsy).

This time of Modern art was a vital period diverting the oblivious. The was an approach to open the energy of creative ability that Surrealists tried to incorporate in their work. With the capable impact of psychoanalysis, the Surrealists trusted the rational mind repressed the power of the imagination, weighting it down with taboos and disbanding logic and literary realism. Contemporary artists, such as Glenn Brown and Inka Essenhigh, continued the legacy of Surrealism in which they created example works that show the impact of psychoanalysis in association to the Modern art period. These artists show instances of not being bound to a specific style, like their predecessors, contemporary surrealistic artists employ a wide variety of techniques to illustrate the fantastical mind of the artist. Numerous bits of artwork had an effect to this time of Modern art and display characteristics which transplant the viewer into a dull and fantastical universe, something that had not been presented until the Contemporary Surrealism development.

Glenn Brown was a painter and sculptor who was best known for borrowing imagery from renowned artists, such as Salvador Dali3, where he then would create wild embellishments which transformed the familiar image into something completely different. He does this by changing the color, position, orientation, height and width relationship, mood and/or size of different objects within the images, therefore changing the overall mannerism of the original painting (Brown n.d.).

The Origin of the World, 2012 by Glenn Brown

Glenn Brown does an exceptional job of creating an abstract image but still shows you detail of a human body within the painting. This is an example of contemporary surrealism, showing you an abstraction but still revealing the overall theme of the picture and that is the origin of us. Brown incorporates all elements of color scheme, different textures in the background compared to the main portraits, and shadows. His techniques show that his talents are more than basic Photoshop skills, but works of art that are overall original. John Walker’s review of Glenn Brown’s work in “The Art Book” explains how Brown began using a computer and Photoshop© software to manipulate imagery in a variety of ways. Walker describes Brown as creating “photographic reproductions” of oil paintings, where he creates the look of thick-layered paint and fascinating brushwork. Glenn Brown is known for borrowing imagery from one painting, such as color, to create one single source while variating the overall theme of the original painting. Although accused of the misuse of original work, Brown clarifies that he is more interested in the reproduced image, which internally becomes a different piece of artwork. With works based on Dali and the earlier ones based on Auerbach, Glenn uses his skills to “freshly” paint and appropriate an artist styles.

Inka Essenhigh is a modern woman painter who creates dreamlike imagery, which references graphic novels and the golden age of animation. To produce her work, she uses automatic drawings and free association where she is thought to also be associated with Pop Surrealism4, due to her recent large-scale landscape paintings depicting weather and the passing seasons of nature. She creates her imagery by sharing the high-gloss surfaces and accentuated colors of her figures. This is contradicting because of her earlier work she focused on line and flatness, whereas now she has changed to sculptural and three-dimensional style (Essenhigh n.d.).