It’s a small show, but the six oil and mixed-media paintings by Frederick Brown on view at the Thomas McCormick Works of Art gallery offer a good sampling of the artist’s energetic, spiritual, closeup portraits. Born in Georgia in 1945, Brown was reared in Chicago, where he studied architecture, then switched to painting at the University of Southern Illinois-Carbondale. He now commutes between New York and Arizona, though he’s currently in Aspen, Colo., producing a series of religious lithographs based on Christ’s descent from the cross.
The paintings on view are part of Brown’s jazz series, which follow his blues series. These works reveal his representational style, yet they strongly recall the abstract expressionist style he worked in when he first moved to New York and saw work by Willem de Kooning.
In the current show, Brown has chosen to move close in to feature his subjects — such as Nat Cole, Benny Goodman and Frank Sinatra — in the same way that Alex Katz and Chuck Close zoom in on a face. So much the better for seeing the vigorous sweeping brushstrokes that make up these enormous, almost three-dimensional faces and for revealing Brown’s vibrant palette. A deep spirituality bordering on moodiness emerges that calls to mind the best of the expressionists’ work (Max Beckmann is another favorite of Brown). What Brown says he shares with these artists is a love of paint as a tactile medium and a love of the act of applying it to a surface.
Brown came to paint such musicians because of another early love. “When I was a kid, I didn’t have the opportunity to learn to play an instrument, but I had always wished I could. I became friendly with a lot of musicians when I came to New York such as Ornette Coleman and Anthony Braxton, and these works grew out of those friendships,” he says.
He paints his large portraits from photographs and composites of photographs, trying to reflect the soul of the individual rather than a pure likeness. “I feel I have the license to develop something that borders between the abstract and realistic,” he says. “In the case of the musicians, I try to bring them and their music to life and do so mostly through their eyes.” The eyes indeed sparkle, especially in the case of Sinatra, or stare straight out at a viewer or close partially in what appears to be deep contemplation. But Brown shortchanges himself a bit. A huge smile makes Sinatra come alive. A yellow ring or halo seems to glow in Goodman’s portrait.
In which school of painting would Brown like to be classified, if at all? “Maybe as a lyrical abstract expressionist, maybe as a figural or realistic portraitist, but probably simply as a painter,” he says. The show continues at 2055 N. Winchester St. until April 25.
Canadian artist Christopher Broadhurst’s paintings at Lydon Fine Art are a slight departure from the artist’s tradition of still lifes. Yet, Broadhurst continues to avoid fashioning sentimental or purely decorative compositions, although his subject matter includes vases filled with flowers, fruits scattered about and an occasional expensive-looking ceramics piece. His colors have become gutsier, and his patterns more diverse. He scatters his objects throughout the composition so that each stands squarely on its own and seems no more important than another. Also, he cleverly includes a “horizon line” and angles it to inject a sense of movement.
In “Chrysanthemums,” the horizon line forms the edge of a geometric tablecloth, rising gently from left to right. In “Senneh,” a vertical vase is juxtaposed against the horizon line, also framed by the tablecloth. The purple tulips add a shock of intense color. The show continues at 301 W. Superior St. through April 30.