Karen Brown
Recapturing a Glimpse of Lost Elegance
by
Dan Koon
"I paint what I call 'fashion art,'" says artist Karen Brown, "because it's refreshing to see images of elegance and femininity in a world of casual conformity. I believe these are qualities that are diminishing in today's world. My paintings are a reminder of a lost era when elegance took priority over comfort."
Looking at her gracefully stylized women, softly rendered in their flowing gowns, perfectly made up, the viewer is transported to a time before baggy jeans and tee shirts.
Karen has always been enamored with the glamour of Hollywood's Golden Age. While attending UCLA she spent many an hour in the film library poring over classics of the 20s, 30s, 40s and 50s. She loved the style of the era. Jean Harlow, Elizabeth Taylor and Audrey Hepburn were particular favorites.
Growing up in Riverside, California, she doodled and even took an art class or two in high school. But never more than that. The film classes in college were more a respite from her psychology major than an academic focus and in fact, art itself was something she appreciated but was not involved with from the creative end. After college she went into teaching and has only in the last few years given herself over to art. It began as a hobby but has now become her full-time pursuit and she is making rapid strides forward. She truly fits the picture of an emerging artist.
And her subject matter resonates with people. Recently, she was in a framing shop getting a couple pieces matted and one woman came in, saw them on a counter and began admiring them. Shortly afterwards, another customer, a distinguished-looking gentleman, noticed them and immediately asked about purchasing some pieces. Encouraged, Karen upgraded her website, which she initially created so that friends and family could see her work, and now anyone can contact her about her art at www.karenjanebrown.com.
Karen cites one of her strongest influences as Patrick Nagel, whose hard-edged, hard-bodied women became the standard fashion look of the 80s. Nagel himself said that he didn't think he would like to meet one of his creations, whose vampire pallor and tough sexuality are almost threatening, and while Karen has adopted Nagel's clean lines and flat areas of color, her images have an altogether different mood. Her work is closer to that of another influence, René Gruau, the famous French fashion artist and illustrator who, with his drawings of exquisitely dressed women in chic surroundings, helped reestablish Paris as the center of haute couture following the devastation of World War II.
Elimination is as important as inclusion
When asked to describe her process, Karen says, "I used to look through magazines and watch movies for inspiration. Now, I simply create the look that I want from my imagination. Obviously, I'm not drawing real women, but once I've got the idea clearly, I start sketching it out. That's the most painstaking part of the process. It takes a few sketches to get the look I want, a certain expression or mood I'm trying to convey.
"I draw the face first and from there I draw the figure. Then on top of that I create the fashion, usually a gown or dress which appears very feminine and glamorous."
"After that, I start eliminating pieces of the figure to create suggestion, so that the image doesn't look like a complete outline."
"From there, I'll transfer it to Arches paper. I get a clean copy on my paper and then I begin painting. I use watercolor pigments because they give me a soft look. The drawing process is where most of my time is spent, getting that right look. The painting is more to accent things."
The result conforms to a very definite objective. She knows what she wants to achieve, as a look at her portfolio here confirms. As Karen explains, "With my art, I am interested in only one thing; creating glamorous images of fashionable women. Some are painted with subtle hues, which create a demure and delicate look. Others are painted with India ink for a more dramatic and edgier look. My work is not about color saturation. Since I work mainly in outline, I create a softer look by eliminating areas of the body and clothing to add suggestion, which invites the viewer into the painting. I am creating an impression of a woman, not an exact likeness. Because of this I sometimes take liberties with the image to create a highly stylized look."
Fortune Strikes in the Form of Fine Art Registry™
She confesses to being somewhat less confident about the other part of the art world—getting the product to market and onto the walls of admirers. "I need to understand the whole marketing area better, the whole business side of it," she says matter-of-factly. "Also, getting more exposure for my work. I'm just starting so I'm trying to find all the avenues to show my work."
Clearly, her work lends itself to graphic media such as prints or posters, and she's looking into that. Recently, she began looking into how to copyright her work and looked into it the old, slow, expensive way, i.e., the US Copyright Office. That wasn’t too appealing so she was Googling around one day and happened to see Fine Art Registry in the search results. She went to the home page and saw an article on Phoenix artist and Fine Art Registry member Josie Taglienti, who, as it happened, was Karen's teacher from a life drawing class she had taken at Paradise Valley Community College.
"I think she had mentioned FAR to me when I was in class," Karen recalls. "I remember thinking 'Wow! This is what she was talking about.' I read her article and what she liked about FAR and read articles about other artists and all the great things FAR provided to them, and I realized 'This is going to be a great way to get started.'
"I'm a very detail oriented person and everything has to be just right with me and this provided that level of professionalism. I know a lot of people sell art on the Internet, but Fine Art Registry legitimizes what I'm doing. It's all recorded and people know I'm the creator of this. To have all the information permanently recorded, it's very professional. I'm glad I found this just as I'm beginning to embark on a whole new experience."
When Teri Franks founded Fine Art Registry, she had artists exactly like Karen in mind. Since time immemorial, artists and the people who admired and collected their work have been playing the complicated game of "who created this?" with respect to art. Innovative artists had their works copied by forgers. Collectors didn't know if they were buying a genuine article. Art historians, conservators, curators and academics have been driven nuts for centuries trying to assign proper authorship to works of art. A good many people in the art market feed on this flotsam and jetsam floating amongst the genuine pieces. (Check sometime on e-Bay for the number of graphic works "signed Picasso" - of course, Grandma Moses could have signed a painting "Picasso.")
Teri's solution was a permanent online registry along with a proprietary system of tagging works with tamper-evident seals. An emerging artist such as Karen, or the people who collect her work, will never be plagued with the age-old problems of authenticity or provenance. Works by her, tagged with a unique seal and recorded in an online database that anyone can access can never be pawned off as something other than what they are, and no one can produce fakes and imitations because the Fine Art Registry tag will be conspicuously absent. As an artist gains traction in the market and his or her works begin to show up on the secondary market, prospective buyers will be able to check the FAR database to ensure they are getting what was promised then transfer ownership to themselves and record the fact permanently.
The nature of many artists (or maybe the wolf at the door) precludes their thinking that far into the future. But the record keeping function of having one's portfolio in the Fine Art Registry database alone behooves even moderately productive artists to register their works.
Compared to the bureaucratic maze at the Copyright Office, Karen sees the Fine Art Registry system as "an efficient and easy way to publicly record my work. I look and feel more professional with FAR backing all of my pieces. Also, there is a wealth of information available for emerging artists, which I have yet to fully utilize, but will."
Karen is glad to be starting her artistic career with Fine Art Registry and we're looking forward to seeing many more of her elegant artworks permanently recorded in an ever-expanding Fine Art Registry portfolio.
Asked about her future, Karen enthusiastically replies, "I'm optimistic because I can see my art displayed in a variety of ways. I can see my images on walls, in magazines, salons or even print media. I don't feel that I'm pigeon-holed in one category or another."
For Karen Brown, schoolteacher turned creator of style and beauty, her relationship with Fine Art Registry couldn't have come at a better time.
— by Dan Koon
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April 3, 2008
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