Blood Riddle Painting

James Brook (British, b. 1974) began as a copyist of Renaissance and late 19th century paintings after graduating with a BA (hons) in Fine Art/Theatre & Film from the University of York St John, UK in 1997. He then turned his attention to drawings he made as a child, utilizing their raw, non-academic nature and painted his first remades, a series of enlarged reproductions of this earlier work. Seeing little difference in high and low art he adopted a slacker sensibility making sculptures using found-objects in thrift stores that reminded him of things he grew up with in his parents home: amateur paintings, porcelain ornaments, defunct machines and ephemera now forgotten by culture. This led him to using other cultural objects pertinent to his adolescence, painting over (adjusting) a series of commercial posters typically found in the bedroom of his youth. His most recent series are what he calls Tangle paintings which contrast with his biographical work as “the opposite of remembering”. His work focuses on human identity, lineage, and time. "A lot of it's to do with stuff that shapes you when you're young. I want to reorganize everything that’s made me me, both good and bad, physical and psychological then turn it into an object so I can be free of it.”