( exerpt from )
Jason Brown in conversation with Matthew Douglas
May 2011
Matthew Douglas I’d like to talk about how your work operates in relation to PEER / PRESSURE
Jason Brown in a general sense my works examines the difference between object and subject, the works look like a quite specific thing but they are not exactly that thing. I would not say they are reproductions or replicas but they can be viewed like that, nor are they faithful reproductions, often its quite obvious what the thing refers to, but they are actually an exagerrated idea of something, like the chest of drawers which has the same dimensions and volume of the original, but is redundant as it cannot function like the thing it looks like. With the window piece the colour on the glass is an idealized colour taken from a website that actually sells these windows.
MD this exaggeration is something played out with the impact of the bird hitting the pane and the sand blasting that recreated the image, they are very different in extremes but do a similar thing.
JB the impact of the sandblaster would easily destroy a window, but the design made sure this wasnt the case, it was a gamble, the piece looks like a very highly designed thing but I like to think that despite its outward stability it is fragile. If a bird hits a window it takes a fraction of a second, but in this case the moment is frozen, the window frame does not just frame a window but also the image, the moment.
MD and your wider practice
JB I think my work examines the differences between the origin of something and the reproductions of these origins. my works look like reproductions of things so it is about the space in between, i think this is where they have an inherent contradiction they are not one thing or another but a version of something. This could be reproduction of a reproduction of an original. they lie in the space in between which is not fixed, I am interested in the gaps inbetween rather than things at each end of the gaps. Thats why I use strange materials, make something that look mundane or straightforward, like the train, that came from a tiny model that I scaled up to child sized toy train, it was made out of cardboard and gaffer tape and looked like a sturdy deigned object but wouldnt last 5 minutes if a child played with it, it’d be ripped to pieces. it doesnt function like the thing it looks like.
MD can we talk a little about the absurd aspect within your work
JB thats something that not so many people recognize, because the way in which the works are produced can seem on the surface very serious, but there is a mocking or a comic aspect to them. I think people take the work seriously must be because of the level of work that has gone into their production, as I spend a long time making something look very simple. however for me that highlights the absurdity that I feel is inherent in all things, for things are only serious because we take them seriously, and I dont mean that casually becuase there are things that seem incredably important to us, snd often these important things are shared and generally agreed upon, but this is only because of the way we look at the world, for example it is not genocide for an army of ants to annhialate another army of ants, but we would think of this very seriously about the same amount of human casualties.
MD Your recent work looks almost industrial, like an injection moulded model or a mass produced toy, but on a much larger scale, I’m thinking most specifically about your train and parcels pieces. Since these works originate from a mass production process, yet you carefully scale them up, reversing this process. You are taking something impersonal or technicratic and making them personal again, this really interests me, since the objects you work from are so small, almost insignificant and they have a small duration as they can be discarded as quickly as the are made. Yet through your working process they gain a significance, a serousness, as you say. I would say this where the absurdity lies, because the level of work that goes into their production makes them absurd.
JB Im not particularly interested in emphasizing the crafted aspect of the works, but more in the idea of design, for example the orginal model of the parcel, is a highly designed representation of a parcel. If you asked many individuals to make a reproduction of a parcel the results would all be very different, but we all recognise the models shape.
MD what you are saying is that it becomes a sign, and yet our individual concept of this sign is depending on our interpretation or conditioning
JB of course, however when I start making a piece I always have a very clear idea of what I want to do, where something comes from and how it will be produced...
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