Tim Brawner. Feels Like Heaven

A sharp counterpoint to the more antiseptic giants, the transi depicted the interred’s putrefied, worm-eaten corpse, often carved virtuously in sumptuous materials such as marble or alabaster. These recumbent figures feel radical to the contemporary viewer but make a compelling argument for the correct preparation of the elite for eternity: the mortal husk remains in the abbey or tomb while something purer sublimates into the heavens.

Brawner’s polymorphic, ever-changing painting style mixes various techniques. Brawner takes inspiration from the visual culture of graphic novels, wherein drawers or boxes of discarded source material are sometimes called morgues. Boemio spoke with him.

You have an intriguing and dramatic imagination; the source is made by historical references but also by B-movies. How interested are you in visual research? How do you expand your aesthetical language?
I trained under a cartoonist briefly after my undergraduate studies, and he got me into the practice of keeping a „morgue“ file of reference imagery. Mostly, it was clippings from books and periodicals. I accepted I wasn’t going to be an illustrator when I never collected typical reference imagery like people shaking hands, vehicles, backgrounds, etc. I was preoccupied with faces and expressions, typically ones that looked monstrous or brutalized. Even before that, as a kid growing up, I tended to collect any imagery I found lurid and save it. Aggregating this imagery is already a generative experience, and after I review my collection, constellations of themes and meanings begin to emerge that further help serve the drafting process for paintings.

Can you introduce us to the ongoing solo show „Feels Like Heaven“ at Von Ammon Co.?
The show is about navigating pleasure and desire in extremis. The central image that most of the work in the show is built around is the cadaver monument, an effigy of a putrefying corpse, its soul now gone and having escaped the indignity of the material world. I’m personally unsure of the latter half of that interpretation. Perhaps they have transcended, or they are hallucinating through an unwinnable situation.

The topic of immortality is one of the more seductive ones; I’m thinking about Cosmists (overcoming death). What about death for you?
A few years ago, I began thinking more seriously about death. I think death can only really be dealt with through distraction and sublimation (unless you’ve successfully anchored yourself to some sort of framework involving God or country). I’m painting subjects, or impressions of these subjects, that emerge from a ground of agnosticism dealing with existential angst and fear, often based around death.

When you make artwork do you have a specific audience in mind?
I don’t. It sounds cliché, but I can’t make a painting unless it’s something I want to see for myself. I just try to keep faith that others share my taste.

Which artists or writers have you influenced or inspired?
To connect to the previous answer, I think an author like Samuel Beckett similarly depicts subjects struggling with the concept of suffering in an agnostic universe. I think of his play „Happy Days“ which contains the image of his protagonist, Winnie, in her home and sinking deeper and deeper into an unexplained sandy quagmire while her husband seemingly cannot help. All the while she’s trying to put on a brave face, going on about what a happy day it is, as she must hold back tears. I also like other authors, including Thomas Ligotti, Dennis Cooper, and Nabokov. Visually, I’m broadly influenced by Flemish painters, German New Objectivity painters, American underground and horror cartoonists, ero guro manga, and giallo.

It’s a solo show to visit and an artist to follow – Camilla Boemio

Exhibition: Tim Brawner – Feels Like Heaven
Exhibition duration: 06 April – 05 May 2024

Address and contact:
Von Ammon Co.
3330 Cady’s Alley NW, Washington, DC 20007
www.vonammon.co
www.instagram.com/vonammonco

Tim Brawner – www.instagram.com/tim_brawner

Camilla Boemio is an internationally published author, curator, and member of the AICA (International Arts Critics) based in Rome. In 2013, Boemio was the co-associate curator of PORTABLE NATION: Disappearance as Work in Progress – Approaches to Ecological Romanticism, the Maldives Pavilion at the 55th International Art Exhibition La Biennale di Venezia. In 2016, Boemio curated Diminished Capacity, the First Nigerian Pavilion at the 16th International Architecture Exhibition La Biennale di Venezia. Boemio’s recent curatorial projects include her role as co-associate curator at Pera + Flora + Fauna. The Story of Indigenousness and The Ownership of History, an official collateral event at the 59th International art exhibition La Biennale di Venezia, which is commissioned by PORT and the state government of Perak, Malaysia, 2022; Saun Santipreecha PER/FORMATIVE CITIES A Nest of Triptychal Performances Presented by Reisig and Taylor Contemporary at AOC F58 Galleria Bruno Lisi, 2024, and the next solo show, Antonio Palmieri TEN YEARS at British School at Roma, in July 2024. Invitations to speak include the Tate Liverpool, MUSE Science Museum, Pistoia Musei, Museo Orto Botanico in Roma, and the Cambridge Festival 2021 at Crassh in the UK. www.instagram.com/camillaboemio/