Millie Brown (performance artist)

Last updated

Millie Brown (born 1986 in London, UK) is an English performance artist known for her work involving vomiting.[ citation needed ] She rose to prominence after a series of collaborations with musician Lady Gaga. [1] She is also a founding member of the !WOWOW! Collective of London, England. [2] She began her career at age 17 on a Berlin stage where she vomited onto a canvas after drinking glasses of dyed milk, a performance that lasted for two hours. [3] In an interview with The Guardian, she states, “I wanted to use my body to create art. I wanted to come from within, to create something beautiful that was raw and uncontrollable.” [3]

Contents

Works

Millie Brown has performed variations of her vomit painting, as well as other forms of performance art.

2018 Performance and film premiere of ‘The impossibility of united formations colliding’ Presented by MAK Center for Art & Architecture featuring the collaboration within James Turrell and John Lautner's ’Above Horizons.’

2017 ‘Human Condition’ performance curated by Johnny Wolf alongside artists Jenny Holzer, Marilyn Minter.

2016 ‘As the cosmos unfolds’ performance and exhibition of new works at Cob Gallery London. ‘Wilting Point’ durational performance and exhibition of new works, at LA Art Show Presented by Ace Gallery, Beverly Hills. Performance curated by Tara Subkoff at Urs Fischers private residence. Performance and exhibition of physical works curated by Stacy Engman at Chicago Expo. ‘Visual Artist of the year’ awarded to Millie Brown by BritWeek alongside talk & exhibition of works Presented by Ace Gallery, Beverly Hills.

2015 ‘Celestial Bodies’ performance at MADE LA alongside film launch on Nowness.com Rainbow Body Performance Presented by MOCA Miami & ArtCapsul, curated by Stacy Engman in conjunction with Ellen Von Unwerth's art series ‘Wilden’ featuring the artist, during Art Basel Miami Beach. Rainbow Body Performance, 4 day durational piece at Gazelli Art House during Frieze Art Fair London. Rainbow Body Performance, 4 day durational piece at Art & Fashion Forum Poland, curated by Grazyna kulczyk.

2014 Suspended by Optimism, Creative Royalty : A Celebration of Women in Art, a fundraiser for Brooklyn Museum Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art and School of Doodle, Curated by Nicole Ehrlich for Art Basel Miami Beach, Fl. Jeffrey Deitch private birthday performance at his Los Angeles residence. Swine, Live performance collaboration with Lady Gaga for her SXSW show, Austin, Tx. Breaking the Body's Boundaries: Performance and Artist Talk, University of Toronto, Curated by Allison Leadley and Kelsy Vivash, Toronto, Canada.

2013 Born This Way Foundation Benefit, Curated by Nicole Ehrlich in collaboration with 5D- Society & Paddle 8, Art Basel Miami Beach, Fl.

2010 Rart Order: Performance and interactive life drawing, Bistroteque, Curated by Leanne Elliot, London, UK.

2008 Late at Tate, Tate Britain, Curated by Andrew Hunt, alongside works by Theo Adams, Matthew Stone and Boo Saville, London, UK.

2007 Fash-Off: Live Performance, SHOWstudio, Curated by Gareth Pugh and Nick Knight, London, UK. Future Hindsight, The Union Gallery, Performance for Matthew Stone's exhibition opening, London, UK. The Children of !WOWOW!, Transmediale Festival, Haus Der Kulturen Der Welt Transmediale, Berlin, Germany. The Event, The Old Train Station, Curated by Andy Hunt, !WOWOW! Intervention in conjunction with The International Project Space, Bournville Centre for Visual Arts, Birmingham, UK.

2006 Switch On/Off, Chapman Fine Arts, Curated by Mark McGowen, London, UK. 2005, A Home for Lost Ideas, Public Gallery Berlin, Germany. Optimism as Cultural Rebellion !WOWOW! Area 10, London, UK. Rising Tendencies Towards a United State of Mind !WOWOW! Kwik Fit Garage, Peckham, UK

SOLO EXHIBITIONS 2015, Rainbow Body, Curated by Nicole Ehrlich and Nathaly Charria, Los Angeles, Ca. 2013, Muted Chronology, Strand Gallery, Curated by Alexander Proud, London, UK. 2012, Celestial Bodies, Illoulian Contemporary, Curated by Candice Illoulian, Los Angeles, Ca. 2010, Series Black, Arthur And Albert Gallery, Curated by Zoniel & Walter Hugo, London, UK.

Rainbow Body

Her solo exhibition, Rainbow Body, Brown conveyed the aesthetic of the Los Angeles Sky through vomiting pastel dyed almond milk onto canvases. [4] Inspired by Tibetan Buddhist theology, she created the exhibition based on three elements of “ground, presence, and energy”. [5]

Rainbow Body Performance

At the Gazelli Art House in London,Brown displayed her body in a gallery window, suspended by rope from the ceiling for her piece Rainbow Body Performance. [6] Crystal prisms dangled from her suspended body creating rainbow reflections around the gallery space. [6]

Suspended by Optimism

In 2014, Brown suspended herself from giant helium balloons for four hours at the entrance of the Miami Beach Resort and Spa for her exhibition Suspended by Optimism. [7] The exhibition opened for Nicole Ehrlich's second annual gala honoring women in art. [7]

The Wilting Point

Brown's exhibition, The Wilting Point took place at the Refinery Hotel of New York in a rotating gallery called “Hatbox”. [8] She laid down in meditation surrounded by freshly cut flowers for seven days with no food, surviving off of only water, as the flowers wilted and decayed around her. [8] The performance was on a 24-hour global live feed on the V Magazine website. [8]

Collaboration with Lady Gaga

Millie Brown is well known for her work with Lady Gaga. They collaborated on a video together in 2009, implementing Brown's dyed milk and vomit painting. [9] Brown and Lady Gaga collaborated on a performance of the singer's song, "Swine" at the SXSW conference in 2014. [3] Brown drank green milk and then regurgitated it onto Lady Gaga's chest. [3]

Criticism

Since her work with Lady Gaga, Brown has been criticized for “glamorizing bulimia”. [3] Much of the disapproval took place on Twitter, with Demi Lovato tweeting, “Bulimia isn’t cool. Young people who are struggling to figure out their identities are seriously influenced by the things they see their idols do.” [3] Brown responded to the outrage over her work by saying, “I’m using my body to create something beautiful. I think it’s misunderstood by a lot of people. But it really doesn’t have anything to do with eating disorders. If I was male [no one would make] such a massive association." [3]

Personal life

She now works and resides in Los Angeles, California. [2] [10]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marina Abramović</span> Serbian performance artist

Marina Abramović is a Serbian conceptual and performance artist. Her work explores body art, endurance art, the relationship between the performer and audience, the limits of the body, and the possibilities of the mind. Being active for over four decades, Abramović refers to herself as the "grandmother of performance art". She pioneered a new notion of identity by bringing in the participation of observers, focusing on "confronting pain, blood, and physical limits of the body". In 2007, she founded the Marina Abramović Institute (MAI), a non-profit foundation for performance art.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nick Knight (photographer)</span> British photographer

Nicholas David Gordon Knight is a British fashion photographer and founder and director of SHOWstudio.com. He is an honorary professor at University of the Arts London and was awarded an honorary Ph.D. by the same university. He has produced books of his work including retrospectives Nicknight (1994) and Nick Knight (2009). In 2016, Knight's 1992 campaign photograph for fashion brand Jil Sander was sold by Phillips auction house at the record-breaking price of HKD 2,360,000.

Jessica Jackson Hutchins is an American artist from Chicago, Illinois who is based in Portland, Oregon. Her practice consists of large scale ceramics, multi-media installations, assemblage, and paintings all of which utilize found objects such as old furniture, ceramics, worn out clothes, and newspaper clippings. She is most recognizable for her sloppy craft assemblages of furniture and ceramics. Her work was selected for the 2010: Whitney Biennial, featured in major art collections, and has been exhibited throughout the United States and internationally, in Iceland, the UK, and Germany.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cornelia Parker</span> British artist

Cornelia Ann Parker is an English visual artist, best known for her sculpture and installation art.

!Wowow! is a collective in Peckham, London. Otherwise known as The Children of !Wowow!, they are a group of artists, fashion designers, writers and musicians, who have promoted numerous art events and parties in London and Berlin.

Matthew Stone is a London-based artist. He is part of the South London art collective !Wowow!.

Ivana Bašić is a Serbian artist living and working in New York.

Jonathan Horowitz is a New York-based artist working in video, sculpture, sound installation, and photography. Horowitz's works focuses on the cultures of politics, celebrity, cinema, war, and consumerism. From found footage, Horowitz visually and spatially juxtaposes elements from film, television, and the media to reveal connections and breakdowns between these overlapping modes of communication.

<i>Artpop</i> 2013 studio album by Lady Gaga

Artpop is the third studio album by American singer Lady Gaga. It was released on November 6, 2013, by Streamline and Interscope Records. Gaga began planning the project in 2011, shortly after the launch of her second effort, Born This Way. Work continued until 2013 while Gaga was traveling for her Born This Way Ball tour and recovering from surgery for an injury she had sustained while touring. Gaga described Artpop as "a celebration and a poetic musical journey". It displays an intentional "lack of maturity and responsibility" by comparison to the darker and anthemic nature of Born This Way.

"Swine" is a song by American singer Lady Gaga, recorded for her third studio album, Artpop (2013). It was written and produced by Gaga, Paul "DJ White Shadow" Blair, Dino Zisis, and Nick Monson. A dubstep and industrial track, "Swine" was inspired by the singer's sexual experiences and the rage she felt from being raped when she was 19 by an unidentified record producer. Throughout the song, Gaga screams out the lyrics, which talk about denouncing a suitor by comparing them to a pig.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">ArtRave: The Artpop Ball</span> 2014 concert tour by Lady Gaga

ArtRave: The Artpop Ball was the fourth headlining concert tour by American singer Lady Gaga. Supporting her third studio album Artpop (2013), the tour ran from May 4, 2014, to November 24, 2014. The tour dates included cities where Gaga had canceled shows of her previous Born This Way Ball tour after suffering a hip injury. The ArtRave tour was preceded by a seven-day residency at the Roseland Ballroom in Manhattan, New York.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ben Moore (curator)</span> British art curator, entrepreneur and artist

Benjamin Neel Critchley Moore is a British art curator, entrepreneur and artist. He is the founder and curator of Art Below, a contemporary art organisation that places art in public places and has had shows in England, Germany, Japan and the United States. He is also the founder and curator of Art Wars, an exhibition of designs based on the Imperial Stormtrooper helmets from Star Wars. In 2021, Moore was part of the Art Wars NFT project which resulted in massive losses for the purchasers of the NFTs and claims of copyright theft from artists whose physical work was reproduced without their permission.

Kate Durbin is an American, Los Angeles, California-based writer, digital and performance artist. She is the author of several books of fiction and poetry including E! Entertainment,ABRA,The Ravenous Audience, and Hoarders. Durbin's work primarily centers around popular culture and digital media, exploring the way the Internet, reality TV, and social media affect society and the human condition. She has called popular culture the subject matter of her work, as well as her artistic material.

Nicole Ehrlich is an American producer, director, and women's rights activist. She is the SVP of Creative and Celebrity Relations and has been the recipient of Grammy, MTV VMA and Emmy Awards. Ehrlich has previously worked for Extasy Records, Geffen Records, and Universal Music Group. She is best known for her work with Lady Gaga, and as a music video producer in general. Her work also includes full-length music DVDs and television production. As a producer of documentaries, her works include the 2015 film The Hunting Ground. In the world of visual art, she is the curator of the annual Art Basel Miami exhibition Celebration of Women in Art.

Cassils is a visual and performance artist, body builder, and personal trainer from Montreal, Quebec, Canada now based in Los Angeles, California, United States. Their work uses the body in a sculptural fashion, integrating feminism, body art, and gay male aesthetics. Cassils is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Creative Capital Grant, a United States Artists Fellowship, a California Community Foundation Visual Artist Fellowship (2012), several Canada Council for the Arts grants, and the Rema Hort Mann Foundation Visual Arts Fellowship. Cassils is gender non-conforming, transmasculine, and goes by singular they pronouns.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shinique Smith</span> American visual artist (born 1971)

Shinique Smith is an American visual artist, known for her colorful installation art and paintings that incorporate found textiles and collage materials. She is based in Los Angeles, California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marguerite Horner</span> British artist

Marguerite Horner is a British artist who won the 2018 British Women Artist Award. Her paintings aim to investigate, among other things, notions of transience, intimacy, loss and hope. She uses the external world as a trigger or metaphor for these experiences and through a period of gestation and distillation, makes a series of intuitive decisions that lead the work towards completion.

Fyodor Borisovich Pavlov-Andreevich is a Brazilian artist, curator, and theater director.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michael Joo</span> Korean-American contemporary artist

Michael Joo is a contemporary artist known for using a combination of scientific language, processes and complex structures that speak to liminality, access, and transmission. Much like Joseph Beuys, Joo uses various media such as sculpture, photography, printmaking, and painting, further referencing cultural heritage, identity, and natural history. He currently lives and works in New York, New York, as a Senior Critic in Sculpture at Yale University. He also teaches at Columbia University in the MFA program.

Ming Wong is a Singaporean contemporary artist who lives and works in Berlin, known for his re-interpretations of iconic films and performances from world cinema in his video installations, often featuring "miscastings" of himself in roles of varied identities.

References

  1. Schotzko, T. Nikki Cesare (2015). "I Haven't Got Time for the Pain: The State and Stakes of Performance Art 2.0". Theatre Research in Canada/Recherches Theatrales Au Canada. 1 (36).
  2. 1 2 "About". Millie Brown. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Benedictus, Leo. "Lady Gaga's Vomit Artist: 'I Have Experienced Migraines'". The Guardian. Retrieved 1 March 2016.
  4. "Rainbow Body". Millie Brown. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  5. "Rainbow Body". Millie Brown.
  6. 1 2 "Rainbow Body Performance". Millie Brown. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  7. 1 2 "Suspended by Optimism". Millie Brown. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  8. 1 2 3 "The Wilting Point". Millie Brown. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  9. "Monster Ball". Millie Brown. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  10. "Millie Brown". www.nowness.com.

Further reading