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Michael Bryan

@msbryanart

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Camberwell grad
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Advertising, desire and difference.

How Michael S Bryan's Caribbean upbringing informs his painting artworks. by @msbryanart

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3 months ago

Michael S Bryan (b. 1981) is an artist and Associate Lecturer. His painting career started after being censured for a nude performance which forced a switch to figurative painting. Since then, he has successfully completed both a BA and MA in Fine Art at the University of the Arts London.

As a Black artist, Bryan is all too familiar with how his own body is seen, closely observed and fetishized. He interrogates the direction and taboo of desire, which he has applied to his own body. He also attempts to deconstruct his own Black Gaze through the mediated image of women, which he sees as all encompassing and powerful.

Bryan paints found images from advertising and text typefaces and merges both creating tension between both elements of his work. Bryan paints with figurative elements, abstracting them in the same manner as the fetishized Gaze does to the Other. He prefers the medium of acrylic as it allows him to work quickly with expressive portraits. He cites the work of David Salle and Cy Twombly as inspiration.

"Painting the work I do is going to cause controversy due to the subject matter, as I've already experienced in the past, but that only made me a stronger more determined artist. Being the recipient of the Male Gaze is an inescapable part of my life as an artist of colour and that is imbued in my art. bell hooks described the "oppositional gaze" as an act of resistance, of which I find is also complicated by who possesses that gaze. Knowing that an image of a white woman was painted by a Black artist is the site of contention that I'm currently exploring."

#acrylicportraiture #textbasedpainting #emergingartists by @msbryanart

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6 months ago

Black Skin, White Paint
2012
Installation

If you're wondering where all the paintings are coming from conceptually, hopefully this explains things:

I was a performance artist, some of the performances I did whilst a Camberwell BA student. My main concern was and still is, is the oppressive white spaces I felt obliged to make work. Add to the fact that I didn't look like a "typical arts student" but someone who could have come off the street at Peckham (where Camberwell is near).

I was negotiating with the White Male Gaze, the white female gaze and my own. Needless to say it hit limits where I wasn't allowed to perform in the 2nd year group show like this.

So my painting practice now gets exactly the same treatment of dealing with all the gazes, including my own on my own body. My current work is based on the years of negotiation with my own body and the inevitable violence it tolerated in the past. I might share some more of my durational works later.

#acrylicpainter #performanceart #blackart by @msbryanart

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8 months ago

Talking about my hybrid figurative/abstract work is equal parts exciting and foreboding - the concepts make sense to me but sometimes I do get concerned that the ideas are high brow enough to not be low brow (the evils of advertising and seduction). Then The Effigy of the Seductress (Baudrillard) comes to the rescue with his take on the seductress's central figure. Oftentimes what you think is a revolutionary is simply echoes of the past picked up by new generations after.
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#acrylicabstractart #acrylicportraiture #amsterdamacrylics @theesop by @msbryanart

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a month ago

Round 2 @esop_advanced_painting
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#acrylicabstractart #acrylicportraiture #amsterdamacrylics by @msbryanart

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a month ago

Class of Camberwell
"As if Waiting to Whistle"
Old Waiting Room, Peckham Rye Station
August 8-9, 2026 taken in Peckham Rye railway station by @msbryanart

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2 months ago

Been out of practice with talking about my work but managed it on the fly 🫣 it's been said that it could make or break how you're seen within the art world, but since I also teach critical art theory, the concepts contained within the work (Baudrillard through to Gail Dines) needed to be also simplified. It's a delicate balance between being accessible to be viewers without boring them. Also I get lost in the explanations (thanks ADHD).
Nevertheless it's been the perfect exhibition and stage to rekindle the desire to create work that I believe in and the reception to that has been great, so thank you @m.g.langston and @eugeniapopesco for the opportunity.
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Photos: Michael Bryan, Cerlin Karunaratne by @msbryanart

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2 months ago

by @msbryanart

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2 months ago

Artist: @victoria_zanc

Multiple layers tracing natural paths, reanimating the earth below. by @msbryanart

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2 months ago

An eclectic selection of artists in a unique space - "As if About to Whistle" at @oldwaitingroom.peckhamrye curated by @m.g.langston and @eugeniapopesco hosted by @maverickprojects

Artist: @m.g.langston

Artist: @muo_kuai

Artist: @m.g.langston

Artist: @matthewclifton

Artist: @msbryanart

Artist: @eugeniapopesco

Artist: @luke.demarest

Artist: @muo_kuai

Artist: Cerlin Karunaratne

Artist: @matthewclifton

Artist: @eugeniapopesco

Artist: @afk10

Artist: @muo_kuai

Artist: @saijalexandra

Artist: Margot Litchfield by @msbryanart

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2 months ago

Giving an artist talk can feel like taking on complex subjects on the fly and hoping they make sense to the audience, but your audience already understands you through the work - mark making, subject matter, the treatment of the canvas etc. Then you realise they are **your** people.

What I didn't touch on is how the paintings link in with the railway theme. As the space is a railway station, inevitably poster board advertisements are ever present, touching on our human needs (to look good, be hydrated, be on holiday, have babies, have energy). My response to being involuntarily simulated is to deface the images. But am I destroying the message or feeding the machine?

#acrylicabstractart #acrylicportraiture by @msbryanart

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2 months ago

Works on show @ the Old Waiting Room Peckham Rye Station taken in Peckham Rye railway station by @msbryanart

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2 months ago