LEAH BROWN

Artist Statement

 

            I create work about the borderland between what is considered real and what is not.  This includes attempts at advancing contiguous, cross-dream narrative and a questioning of the active agency of the dreamt through a combined process of meditation and creation. Within a dream, shape-shifting is a common experience. One person becomes another; one space dissolves into the next. This is the experience I am attempting to recreate: this multiplicity of object-hood and its transformation into metaphor.  One observation I made about dream content in general was that if I engage for much of the day in a repetitive physical activity, as I often do as part of my sculptural process, that I am likely to continue perceiving that action while asleep. I use this phenomenon to my advantage by creating labor-intensive, life-size tableaux of remembered characters and events in order to induce them back into my nightly dreaming. These works begin as illustrations, but become artifacts of invocation, and I regard them almost as magical objects. My materials include a combination of plaster, found objects, hair (which plays a large role within the narrative), and castings from life and from clay. 

 

 

​Bio

 

Leah Brown is a Ft Lauderdale-based sculptor and installation artist. She received her BFA with honors from the Rhode Island School of Design (2004), and an MFA in Sculpture from the University of Miami (2014). In addition to her studio practice, Leah is co-curator of the FATVillage Arts District in Ft Lauderdale, FL, where she oversees the execution of art exhibitions at the 501c3 nonprofit gallery, THE PROJECTS Contemporary Art Space. She is also a partner and artist for the public art and design collaborative, Art+Light+Space. Leah has participated in several artist residencies, lectured and given workshops nationally, and is a recipient of the South Florida Cultural Consortium Fellowship (2013).