Hugh Brown

"Allegedly": New Chainsaw Works

At the Robert Berman Gallery
Opening Reception: July 17, 2010, 6-9pm

Hugh Brown Interview with Greg Escalante and Wendy Sherman July 5th, 2010

Greg: Was the Grand Central show your first art show of this body of work?
Hugh: Yes - Greg, you were over at my house at a meeting about the Alex Steinweiss (http://www.alexsteinweiss.com/) show and you saw the Calder piece and one other piece and asked me what they were about and how many were there and I said there were about seven and there were eventually going to be more. You asked me if I was interested in showing these pieces and I said "yes!". The pieces were made for a coffee-table book that I had started in 1986 called Saw: The Chainsaw in Popular Culture.

Calder "Three Acrobats. One Chainsaw"
Wire and wood   8" x 9" x 12"

When I was laid off from Rhino I decided to use the severance time to try and finally finish the book. The fakes you saw were going to be part of a two page sub-section in the chapter of the book called "Chainsaws In Fine Art," which included artists such as Jim Dine, Chuck Arnoldi, and Tom Sachs, who had actually included chainsaws in their work. The sub-section was titled "What If?" – what if Warhol had done one, what if Marcel Duchamp had done one, what if Calder had done one, what if? It would have been only a small section in this larger chapter, with 10 to 15 pieces. What would have only been a two page section of the book ended up being 18 months worth of work for a show at Grand Central... (http://www.grandcentralartcenter.com/ArtGallery_gcartgallery.php?id=284)

Tom Sachs – CHANEL Chainsaw

I had just finished the John Baldessari and we went down to Grand Central and I laid the 8 foot tall Baldessari out on the floor and somebody burst out laughing and said "Do you want a show next May?" My goal was to have 40 pieces. I think I ended up with 45 pieces in the show. When the show opened I remember standing in the doorway and I hadn't really seen them all together, the older pieces with the new ones, I remember thinking – "Hey, maybe this will work!" It really does look like it could be from a permanent collection.

John Baldessari "Chainsaw Fighting (from Yellow to Green) Digital archival inkjet print  16" x 96"

Then it turns out that it was pretty well received. It did fake out the writer from the OC Weekly. (http://www.ocweekly.com/2009-05-07/culture/allegedly-the-hugh-brown-chainsaw-collection-grand-central-art-center/)  I remember he got to the place I was hoping someone would realize the whole thing was fake – the Walker Evans piece that was dated 1936 with a question mark. The theater marquee had a movie poster from 1986, "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Part 2," which was clearly wrong! Me being the gullible supposedly collector! The original idea for the collection was that I was going to be the extremely rich art collector who collected anything with a chainsaw in it, which is basically true in real life! So it was supposed to be questionable whether I did them or not, or if I was someone who just collected these pieces.

Walker Evans "Movie Theater on Saint Charles Street. Liberty Theater, New Orleans, Louisiana" Archival inkjet print  8" x 10"

Greg: I remember exactly what you said – that 'What I'm hoping is, an art critic will get to about here, and he will realize that the whole show is fake!' That would be the best possible case scenario – and you ended up getting that review in the OC Weekly!
Hugh: And I remember getting three calls from all the people at Grand Central asking me "Do you know this guy?" They all read it and thought he was a friend of mine, because it was so perfect! I think what tipped it off was that the guy was a big fan of Barbara Kruger and he had just seen her show and he looked at the Kruger piece and thought, "Hey, this piece wasn't in that show I just saw!" My favorite thing was at the closing, I was following this older couple and they didn't even seem to notice the chainsaws, but they were impressed by the big names,  Van Gogh, Jackson Pollock...

Barbara Kruger "I Saw Therefore I Am"
Archival inkjet print on vinyl 55" x 55"

Greg: So after the show ended, anything happen after that?
Hugh: Well, we were late getting the catalog finished, for various reasons. But since it was late getting to the printer, we were able to get the installation pictures in, so that was nice. And we have some extra pieces in the catalog that weren't in the show. We've got a couple of great essays – by Mike McGee and Kristine McKenna. The catalog came out really nice. And I wanted to travel the show to New York. So a friend of mine, photographer Bob Seidemann (http://www.bobseidemann.com/), was going to New York  to meet with Sotheby's during the big photography fair and he asked me if he could take some prints with him to show them. I gave him the Diane Arbus and the Baldessari and a few others, (six total). So, I get a call from the restaurant where Bob is having lunch with the people from Sotheby's and Bob says, "They went totally ape shit, the woman who is the head of the Sotheby's photo department fell off of her chair, she was laughing so hard." The woman from Sotheby's immediately called a dealer in San Francisco named Robert Koch and said, "You've got to give this guy a show!"

Diane Arbus "Child with toy chainsaw in Griffith Park"
Gelatin silver print  20" x 24"

Greg: So do you have a show scheduled for New York or San Francisco?
Hugh: I have a show tentatively scheduled at Robert Koch Gallery in San Francisco for Fall 2010. They're working out the details. They originally called me and wanted to include some of my photographs in a group show with the working title "Satire and Humor in Photography," but it looks like they're going to move the schedule around and I'll do a solo show. They usually only show photography at that gallery, but I told them that I didn't want to split up the show, so they're going to show everything that they can fit on the wall. Even some of the sculptural pieces that can fit on a shelf on the wall. An art dealer friend in New York is trying to get the show at a museum there and in Paris. I don't want to jinx it by talking about it.

Jackson Pollock "Arterial Mist"
Enamel, aluminum paint and oil on canvas  40" x 78"

Greg: Your upcoming show is going to be at the Berman Gallery? How is this show different than the show at Grand Central?
Hugh: Yes, at the Berman Gallery. There will be 8 or 9 new pieces in this show, (that weren't in the Grand Central show) including a second Jackson Pollock (later period) piece and a Jasper Johns piece that I'm just finishing up now, that's probably the best piece I've done so far. The catalog will be available. And, of course, everything will be for sale. Although, I was hoping that someone would buy the whole collection. Maybe Eli Broad? (Laughs.) Or a museum? I like the idea of keeping the whole show together, kind of like a warped history of modern art. It's a valuable teaching tool – I think there were 4 or 5 art history classes that came through the show at Grand Central. My goal was to have somebody who came through the exhibit during the school year would years later remember, "Oh yeah, Warhol did something with a chainsaw. I saw it!"

Andy Warhol "Chainsaw and Sickle"
Screenprint and acrylic on canvas  24" x 30"

Greg: So, tell us about your life previous to this current body of work. You have had a pretty interesting life so far... You were the Creative Director at Rhino Records during it's heyday, and didn't you win 3 or 4 Grammys?
Hugh: My previous career went even further back than Rhino. I started out as a photographer during the punk days. I lived in the bay area and I went to college at Berkeley. Every night for two years I went to the Mabuhay Gardens (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mabuhay_Gardens) and photographed all the bands that played there – Devo, Patti Smith, The Dictators, The Avengers, The Nuns. Then I started doing t-shirts for the bands I took photos for. Some of the first shirts were for the Talking Heads... I learned silk screening in college (Berkeley) where I was studying journalism, but I wanted to make documentary films. I ended up getting my degree in Psychology and Criminology, which was the perfect thing for going into the music business! (Psychology for dealing with the bands and Criminology for dealing with the record labels – I told that to the head of Warner Bros. once!) So, one of the bands I did t-shirts for asked me if I wanted to do an album cover for them and that's how I started doing covers.

I had a show of some of my artwork at a place called the Postcard Palace in 1978 and The Clash saw a piece in the show that they liked that ended up on the cover of "Give 'Em Enough Rope." I knew them because I had taken photos of them before and we had this relationship where we used to joke around with each other. So when they said that they wanted to use the piece for the cover I thought they were joking! Then I got a call from the record company later and they were asking me for the artwork, and I said, "Oh, they were serious?" So I had to rush around to send it out to the record label at the last minute. There were a lot of changes made to the cover in England and New York and my name ended up not even being on the cover! But I got a lot of attention for that one.

Then in 1989 I was working freelance and I ended up getting hired by IRS records for 6 years. I caught the tail end of the GoGos and worked on Concrete Blonde, English Beat, General Public. It was a fun place to work. Then after that was Rhino. 3 Grammys, 11 nominations. Since the music was old, we had to do something special with the packaging in order to get people to buy it. We did elaborate packaging with a sense of humor about it. My favorite package was not such a huge seller, it was called "70s Party Killers" – music that you put on to clear a room when you want everyone to go home. We spent the entire budget building an elaborate set like you would see on a Bugs Bunny cartoon when somebody wants to get out of a room so bad that they run through a wall. We cut out the shapes of two figures like they had just run through the wall, people hitting themselves with a hammer, somebody standing on a chair trying to hang himself... It was really badly art directed, very 70s with a big shag rug. I was a big fan of music and I grew up with all of those album covers.

Wendy: What packages won the Grammys?
Hugh: The first one was for "Music As Heard on the Titanic" which had nothing to do with the movie, but was all music played by a traditional band like one that would have played on the Titanic. Since all the music was public domain, we were able to spend almost the entire budget on the packaging. As it turned out, it ended up winning a bunch of awards, not just the Grammy. A lot of people were buying it just for the package. That year Rhino won for both categories – single package (for Titanic) and box set for "Beg Scream and Shout," a compilation of old 60s soul music. Then a couple years later I won for "Brain In A Box" (science fiction music) box set. I took my name off the Talking Heads "Once In A Lifetime" box that won in 2004, because it was Stefan Sagmeister's idea to use the paintings by Russian artists Dubossarsky & Vinogradov (http://www.dubossarskyvinogradov.com/paintings2/). They are these weird neo-realist non sequitur paintings - the artwork really makes the package. I told Stefan he had to take the credit, so I didn't get that Grammy.

Greg: When is the show coming up?
Hugh: The show at Berman's (in the C2 Gallery) is coming up on Saturday, July 17th. It should be entertaining even if you saw the other show (at Grand Central). There are the new pieces in the catalog that weren't in the Grand Central show – Yves Klein, David Levinthal, the second Jackson Pollock and the Jasper Johns – maybe my favorite piece in the show. And the catalog will be available, at the opening from 6-9pm on the 17th. We also got a great review of the catalog by Greil Marcus in the June issue of The Believer Magazine (http://www.believermag.com/issues/201006/). And a friend from the photographic arts council at LACMA, who collects one of the photographers represented in the show, called up and asked if she could bring the whole council to the opening and/or do a walk through of the show. I said, "Not only can you do both of those, but I'll come load them all up in a truck and bring them over myself!"

Don't miss this fantastic show opening on
Saturday, July 17th, 2010
6:00 - 9:00pm
at the Robert Berman Gallery
http://www.robertbermangallery.com/

All artwork and catalog will be available for sale at the show.

Hugh Brown will be available at the opening to sign the exhibit catalog,
available from Grand Central Press
http://www.grandcentralartcenter.com/GrandCentralPress_Books.php

For more information, please contact:
ROBERT BERMAN GALLERY
At Bergamot Station Arts Center
2525 Michigan Avenue, C2, Santa Monica, Calif 90404
Tel: C2 310.315.9506 / D5 310.315.1937
Email: berman@artnet.net

For more info on Hugh Brown:
http://www.sawmeister.com/

All images courtesy of Hugh Brown

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