{"id":513264,"date":"2026-04-04T22:47:26","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T22:47:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/513264\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T22:47:26","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T22:47:26","slug":"cecily-brown-unearths-the-secrets-behind-her-paintings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/513264\/","title":{"rendered":"Cecily Brown unearths the secrets behind her paintings"},"content":{"rendered":"

The last time I interviewed Cecily Brown, it was early in 2020 and neither of us had any idea that a global pandemic was about to put our lives on hold. The British artist, who has been based in New York City for the past three decades, was preparing to return to the UK to exhibit her work at Blenheim Palace; we talked, then, about her nostalgic vision of the English countryside and the darkness that lies beneath that veneer of fantasy, manifested in the enchanting yet menacing works she had created for that show.<\/p>\n

\"abstractCopyright Cecily Brown<\/p>\n

\u2019Nature Walk with Paranoia\u2019 (2024) by Cecily Brown<\/p>\n

\u201cI never got to see it, by the way,\u201d says Brown, ruefully, of the exhibition, which was repeatedly postponed due to successive lockdowns. This year, she hopes to be here in person for her Serpentine presentation, which \u2013 like its forerunner, and in similarly idyllic surroundings \u2013 will conjure a vision of lush, flourishing beauty with a threatening undertone. <\/p>\n

Her inspirations come from Kensington Gardens itself, of which she has fond memories from her time as an art student (she recalls seeing the work of her then-teacher Maggi Hambling<\/a> at the Serpentine back in 1988), and from the children\u2019s-book illustrations that played a formative part in her creative development. \u201cI\u2019ve gone back to things I looked at when I was little, from Beatrix Potter and Orlando the Marmalade Cat to vintage Ladybird books, and I\u2019ve come to realise how influential they were in terms of using a picture to enter another world,\u201d she explains. Like the best fairy tales, her recent nature paintings teeter on the boundary between fantasy and fear. \u201cIt might look like I\u2019m showing a scene of a walk in the park, but there\u2019s someone behind every tree. I think I\u2019m trying to find that place where things are just slightly distorted and there\u2019s an edge of unease or paranoia.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"abstractGenevieve Hanson<\/p>\n

\u2019A Round Robin\u2019 (2023-2024) by Cecily Brown<\/p>\n

The new paintings, which include a rendition of the gallery, featuring Brown\u2019s signature energetic brushstrokes and rich palette, sit alongside archival pieces \u2013 among them an aptly selected series of boating scenes in which human bodies seem to dissolve into the watery backdrop \u2013 and a number of pen-and-ink works. “They\u2019re very much working drawings \u2013 I\u2019ll take an image and draw it over and over, so that when I paint, I know the subject so well that it just comes out,” she says, adding that the more figurative approach she takes when sketching helps viewers to decode her paintings. Indeed, all her work invites a lingering gaze: the longer you look, the more secrets may reveal themselves within those chaotic swirls of colour. “I like to trip people up,” adds Brown. “My hope is that there\u2019s always something to catch their eye and lure them in.”<\/p>\n

\u2018Cecily Brown: Picture Making<\/a>\u2019 is at Serpentine South from 27 March to 6 September (serpentinegalleries.org).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The last time I interviewed Cecily Brown, it was early in 2020 and neither of us had any…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":513265,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[6225,6485,6486,9262,179428,1120,381,96,1156,179427,179429,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-513264","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-arts-and-design","10":"tag-artsanddesign","11":"tag-content-type-feature","12":"tag-contentid-cccd94b0-6487-4804-aafd-7cc6d899cd44","13":"tag-design","14":"tag-displaytype-standard-article","15":"tag-entertainment","16":"tag-locale-gb","17":"tag-shorttitle-cecily-brown-my-art-has-an-edge-of-paranoia","18":"tag-subsection-bazaar-art","19":"tag-uk","20":"tag-united-kingdom","21":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513264","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=513264"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513264\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/513265"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=513264"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=513264"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=513264"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}