Event
Mia Brownell: Plate to Platelets
In her Plate to Platelet series of paintings, Mia Brownell combines diagrammatic space with a stark black/white/gray palette that graphically delineates the ambiguous and contradictory spaces she is constructing. Occupying positions within these spaces are collections of fruit painted in a meticulous, illusionistic style.
Sometimes the still life elements rest upon the fragments of shelves that lean and turn in space, alternately fixed, floating or falling. The shelves frequently cast shadows onto their indefinite surroundings, encouraging the viewer to read them simultaneously as space and surface.
Connecting the otherwise isolated images are linear devices that resemble vines, umbilical cords or arteries. The relationships indicated by the linear elements evoke the kinds of systems represented by organizational flow charts.
Brownell says, “These paintings dissect and interweave fundamental elements of nature, food, and culture – of movement, and impulse – that might be labeled theatric. My motivations stem from the confluences between the seductive excesses of food culture, the vanity and illusionism of traditional still life painting, and the constructed spaces of computer generated scientific imaging.”
Curated by David Borawski
About the Artist
Mia Brownell was born in Chicago, Illinois to a sculptor and biophysicist. She uses the conventions of the the painted food still life as a means to comment on contemporary issues surrounding food. Her paintings simultaneously reference 17th century Dutch Realism and the coiling configurations of molecular imaging.
Mia has had solo exhibitions in major American cities including New York, Boston and Washington, DC.
Mia’s paintings are in several private, corporate, and public art collections including Wellington Management, Fidelity Investments and the National Academy of Sciences.
Her work has been reviewed and published in numerous publications including The Boston Globe, The Village Voice, New York Times, HiFructose and Artnet Magazine.
Mia’s paintings have been included in over 130 group exhibitions worldwide where she has exhibited with several celebrated artists counting Robert Gober, Cindy Sherman, and Alexis Rockman.
She teaches painting and drawing in New Haven at Southern Connecticut State University.
Featured image: Plate to Platelet VII, 2017. Oil on linen, 30″ x 36″
