Young Talent 2015: Alicia Brown

Alicia Brown – Character

Alicia Brown – Character

Alicia Brown – Character

Alicia Brown – Character

Alicia Brown – Character

Alicia Brown – I Wish I Had Your Hair

Alicia Brown – I Wish I Had Your Hair

Alicia Brown – I Wish I Had Your Hair

Alicia Brown – I Wish I Had Your Hair

Here is the second in our short posts on the artists in the Young Talent 2015 exhibition, which opens on August 30:

Alicia Brown was born in St Ann, Jamaica in 1981. She attended the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts, Kingston, Jamaica, and received a diploma in Art Education in 2003 and a BFA in Painting in 2009. Alicia also attended the New York Academy of Art in New York and obtained an MFA in Painting in 2014.

Artist’s Statement

The use of mimicry as a tool for creative invention, imitation and expression plays a vital role in formulating cultural identity. This is evident in the formation of subcultures, resulting from class distortion associated with colonialism. The desire for social acceptance and the search for missing pieces of self is the gateway to copying dominant cultures. This desire becomes a fantasy that is embraced while reality is rejected.

My work invests itself in a social critique, addressing issues of social construct, colonialism, pop culture, Western trends and their impact on Caribbean identity. I reference Dutch 16^th and 17^th century portraiture, where aspects of this history are appropriated and re-contextualized in their representation. I use portraiture as a tool to imitate this model, incorporating both traditional and contemporary painting languages as dialogue on identity.