HOMUNCULUS
2012
Archival pigment print and pastel on paper (60 x 40 inches each;) bronze feathers (dimensions variable); silver feathers (dimensions variable); archival pigment print on vinyl (dimensions variable); cast and cold-worked glass (12 x 12 x 30 inches each); wood, Fortuny fabric
Images from exhibition at Schroeder Romero, NYC
Using alchemy as a jumping-off point, this multimedia, two-part installation explores the act of liberation through transformation, of achieving a spiritual transformation through a brutal physical event. All the works are created via different processes of breaking down and rebuilding: 18th and 19th-century etchings are collaged and digitally manipulated; an antique table is cut in half, resized, and cast in various colors of glass; roadkill turkey feathers are cast in bronze and sterling silver, given new life.
Writing about HOMUNCULUS, Alpesh Kantilal Patel states, "Brown's works are queer. They are unstable signifiers that exist between here and there as well as now and then; and operate on a meta-level through the production of a palpable destabilizing effect. In the process, these works make felt the impossibility of the closure of identity, broadly construed."
