About Paul Brewster
Taken as a whole, the work Brewster has produced over the years probably puts him in the ‘narrative camp’ as an artist, but not obviously so. To make sense of his images, you most likely need to piece them together for yourself - for him, the ongoing process in practice relying on suggestion and dislocated form to evoke multiple readings.
Known mostly for his portraits and metaphorical figurative painting, his current body of work from the Waxing the Slide series of paintings has been ongoing throughout his career. Linked intrinsically to memory - especially those powerful moments forged in childhood - is paramount in these paintings; not however in a literal sense but more directed lyrically in a way reminiscent as a brief whiff of a certain fragrance conjures up something powerful from our past we can't initially quite grasp.
The starting point for a work is no less diverse. Drawn to an array of ‘subject matter’, it is the constructed world where he finds his motivation lies. Life and Media, Religion and Family, Urban and Rural topography, it is things such as these which have significantly shaped both subject and vehicle for the work to develop and evolve across various media from painting and back to painting time and again via video and sound.
