Skulldiver III (Flightmask)

Cecily Brown's study of painting was a rebellious move during a time when installation art and the deconstruction of the object were in vogue in 1990s London.  Her passion for the medium of painting has resulted in grand and ambitious canvases revealing her respect for and inspiration from the history of art. From Goya, Poussin and Hogarth to the gestural abstraction the mid-twentieth century, especially de Kooning and Francis Bacon, Brown studies and willingly excavates the past while reinvigorating 21st century painting.  The figure and human flesh are of keen interest to the artist who has brought a female perspective to the depiction of the naked figure, creating erotic canvases and painting unashamedly luscious surfaces.