MIA BROWNELL: Plates to Platelets

and Other Things That Travel and Bind

The Fulginiti Pavilion for Bioethics and Humanities

University of Colorado at Denver

Curated by Simon Zalkind

January 11 – March 8, 2018

Opening reception: January 11

Goodwin Fine Art

1255 Delaware Street, Denver 80204

January 12 – February 24, 2018

Opening reception: January 12

In this new series Plate to Platelets: and other things that travel and bind I simultaneously draw on scientific images of platelets (tiny blood cells shaped like plates) and the history of the painted food still life. My inspirations focus on the 17^th century still life tradition of plates being painted on the precipice of a table’s edge (often looking like they are about to fall) and how platelets rush to the site of damage to repair. I fantasize about what the cultural/social equivalents to platelets could be, as well as, other things that travel and bind in and outside of our bodies.

These paintings dissect and interweave fundamental elements of nature, food, and culture – of movement, and impulse - that might be labeled theatric. My motivations stem from the confluences between the seductive excesses of food culture, the vanity and illusionism of traditional still life painting, and the constructed spaces of computer generated scientific imaging. I imagine the entanglement between the consumerist idealization of food with its biological engineering and the molecular strains that then interact with our bodies. The space I paint attempts to capture this paradoxical perspective, one that is equally rational and fantastical, material and in constant flux. If we are what we eat, what are we becoming? These entanglements reveal a new nature of food and the cultures that adopt or are dependent on it. Food and science have become dynamic fields for both exploration and manipulation and we are made vulnerable and powerful by it.   

'Plate to Platelets: and other things that travel and bind'

New Paintings by Mia Brownell exploring biology and still life as metaphor for fragility and strength.  Opening January 2018 in Denver:

The Fulginiti Pavilion for Bioethics and Humanities

University of Colorado at Denver

Curated by Simon Zalkind

January 11 - March 8, 2018

Goodwin Fine Art

1255 Delaware Street, Denver  80204

goodwinfineart.com  303.573.1255

January 12 - February, 2018