Brad Brown, born 1964 in Raleigh, North Carolina, received a BFA in Painting and Printmaking from Virginia Commonwealth University in 1987. He currently lives and works in San Francisco, California.
Brad Brown uses unusual approaches in making his work. He works primarily on paintings and works on paper. His projects tend to be expansive, open-ended series that can remain unfinished for years. The largest project to date, The Look Stains, began in 1987 and consists of tens of thousands of works on paper that are continually worked on, torn up, re-drawn, and re-contextualized. Similarly, his painting project, Piece, began in 2001 and consists of hundreds of paintings on wood that are continuously evolving. Brad Brown is not looking for the end of the work, goals, or completion. His interest is in the accumulations and transformations that result as the work is pushed through time and images pile up.
Brad Brown has received grants and awards from the California Arts Council, the Ruth Chenven Foundation, the Western States Art Federation and the Vermont Studio Center. His work is in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art (New York City, USA), the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (San Francisco, USA), the National Gallery (Washington DC, USA), Palace of Legion of Honor (San Francisco, USA), Arkansas Museum of Art (Littlerock, USA), Blanton Museum of Art, University of Texas (Austin, USA), Art Bank Program, US Department of State (Washington DC, USA), Asheville Art Museum (Asheville, USA), The Columbus Museum (Columbus, USA), CU Art Museum, University of Colorado (Boulder, USA), Williams College Museum of Art (Williamstown, USA), Knoxville Museum of Art (Knoxville, USA), and the Boise Art Museum (Boise, USA), among others.