Museums should not be taken for granted
Glenn Brown contemporary British painter in the Ludwig Museum, Budapest
MúzeumCafé 16.
At the opening of his recent exhibition in Budapest’s Ludwig Museum, Glenn Brown spoke to MúzeumCafé about his art and his experiences in relation to museums. An extremely reserved artist, he refused to be photographed in Budapest, as he does elsewhere in the world. As he says, he intends to reveal himself only through his art and ideas. “I was born in Hexham, a small town in the north of England. I was rather old, in my late teens, when I first went to a museum and was able to understand the paintings. In my childhood I wasn’t taken to museums. This late awakening perhaps helps me to enjoy museums today. I regard them like a time travel. Looking at the paintings I can reach into the past. For me, walking around the National Gallery in London is like travelling through the past centuries. “To me coming across art meant gaining some purpose and sense in my life. Before that I hadn’t known what I wanted to be. I realized that around the age of 18. Until then I hadn’t met any artists and I didn’t understand how you became one. Living artists? I thought all artists were already dead. “I got into art college almost by accident. I first studied at the School of Art in Norwich, then in Bath and in the end I attended Goldsmith’s College in London. In addition to college, I also worked at the Tate Gallery in London. I felt it was a great privilege to be paid for being among paintings. I also worked in a bookshop selling albums about art. That certainly educated me. Pop-culture from sci-fi to pop music is present in my art. Many people regard pop music and pop art as disposable media. In a certain sense I also revolted against pop – I thought I didn’t want to create disposable objects.
“The Tate Gallery was my first great museum experience. When I initially went there Tate Modern didn’t exist. I liked the set up, which meant that I could walk from one room where 14th-century paintings were exhibited to a room where works created hardly a few months before were being displayed. The Tate can provide a complex and deep experience for those who want to understand works of art thoroughly. “The Metropolitan Museum in New York has a fantastic collection of paintings, but then every museum in each city offers me something. There are smaller museums which don’t have paintings by Monet, Cézanne or Picasso and exhibit works only by local painters, but they can also be of quality. “For instance, 20th-century Hungarian painting has a special style, which is recognisably different from other countries. It’s perhaps a bit darker and gloomier than English, American or German painting. It’s more mysterious. It also struck me that a number of 20th-century Hungarian painters didn’t follow the internationally fashionable styles, for example American pop art. British painting was dominated by American trends for a long time, while Hungarian painters were more individual. “I like smaller, quieter galleries and museums which hold a few outstanding works of art. Dulwich Gallery is such a place in south London. The collection includes Rembrandt and the Impressionists. “I like museums which are full of paintings. I’m an old fashioned artist in many senses.”