SNOWBALL
2011
oil on linen
22 x 30 inches

San Francisco-based Christopher Brown’s subject is a snowball fight in the 1940s or 50s (we can infer these decades by the car), with intimations of small town life hovering in the air. Through Brown’s skillful paint handling, the winter colors of blue and white snow form a particularly sensitive backdrop to the browns, yellows and blacks of the figures. Growing up in the Midwest, Brown has stated that memory and his own past have been crucial to his creative process and that representational painting best expresses his attempts at depicting narrative and emotion. In this case, Brown conveys the sense of looking at a painted memory, one that is growing as indistinct as the place and era being pictured. Christopher Brown was born in 1951 in Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, studied at the University of Illinois and University of California, Davis, and is the recipient of two NEA awards as well as a Fulbright/DAAD award. He taught at UC Berkeley from 1981 to 1994, and a major touring retrospective of his work was organized by The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth.

estimated retail value:  $35,000

opening bid:  $25,000

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