James Brown was born in 1951 in Los Angeles, California. He studied painting and printmaking at the Immaculate Heart College in Hollywood and then attended the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, from which he graduated in 1974. He spent the following years living and working in Paris. In 1978, he had his first solo exhibition at the Gemeentemuseum of Arnheim, in the Netherlands, as well as his first solo show at the Christiane and Eric Germain Gallery in Paris. In 1979, Brown moved to New York, where he worked alongside artists of the rising Neo-Expressionism movement such as Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring and Julian Schnabel. He had his first exhibitions in the U.S. at the Shafrazi Gallery and the Leo Castelli Gallery, both in New York. At that time he also worked with the Lucio Amelio Gallery in Naples. Although best known for his abstract paintings, Brown’s artistic practice has always been eclectic and varied in his experimentation with different techniques such as ceramics, bronze, textiles and printmaking. In 1995, James Brown moved to Mexico with his young family.
In 2000, he and his wife Alexandra founded Carpe Diem Press in Oaxaca, creating, with leading artists and writers, limited-edition artist books and prints. James Brown’s works have been shown in many American and European museums. In Mexico, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Oaxaca as well as the Anahuacalli Museum in Mexico City have hosted important exhibitions of his recent work. The work is also found in many international private and public collections, including the Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum and the Whitney Museum in New York, the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, the Kolumba Museum in Cologne, the Contemporary Art Centre of Malaga in Spain, and the Tamayo Museum in Mexico City. James Brown passed away in February 2020.
Exhibitions
Publications
Works
Exhibitions
Centro Cultural La Cúpula, Merida, Yucatan, Mexico
USC Fisher Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA, USA
Galerie Karsten Greve, Paris, France
Texas Gallery, Houston, TX, USA
Galleria L´Ariete, Bologna, Italy
GAM – Galleria Civica d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Turin, Italy
Galerie Karsten Greve, Paris, France
Galerie Lelong, Paris, France
Studio d'Arte Raffaelli - Palazzo Wolkenstein, Trento, Italy
Akira Ikeda Gallery, Berlin, Germany
Soave Arte moderna e contemporanea, Alessandria, Italy
Site Gallery, Sheffield, VT, USA
Galerie Karsten Greve, Paris, France
Galerie Karsten Greve, Cologne, Germany
Galerie Pierre Bergé, Brussels, Belgium
Fisher Landau Center, New York, NY, USA
Aidan Gallery, Moscow, Russia
Ex-Escuela Quintana Roo, Merida, Mexico
Juliana Gallery, Seoul, South Korea
Wetterling Gallery, Stockholm, Sweden
Livingstone Gallery, Den Haag, Netherlands
Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rouen, France
Gallery Anthony Grant, New York, NY, USA
MACO, Oaxaca, Mexico
Von der Heydt Museum, Wuppertal, Germany
Embassy of Mexico and Gallery Hilario Galguera, Berlin, Germany
Artnews Projects, Berlin, Germany
Galerie Samuel Lallouz, Montreal, Canada
Sèvres, Paris, France
El Eco, Mexico City, Mexico
MACO, Oaxaca, Mexico
Paul Kasmin Gallery, New York, NY, USA
Chelsea Art Museum, New York, NY, USA
Texas Gallery, Houston, TX, USA
I.P.C., New York, NY, USA
Ulmer Museum, Ulm, Germany
Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio, Bologna, Italy
Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City, Mexico
Palazzo Martinengo, Brescia, Italy
Museo de Arte Comtemporaneo, Oaxaca, Mexico
Museo de Arte Contemporaneo, Oaxaca, Mexico
Castello Normanno Svevo, Bari, Italy
Ceramica de Muel, Zaragoza, Spain
Musée d’Art Moderne, Liège, Belgium
Piazza del Plebiscito, Naples, Italy
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia
Kunstmuseum Bonn, Germany
Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France
Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Galerie Colbert, Paris, France