Marius von Brasch
Von Brasch’s work highlights the power of unconscious filters that shape perception. Imagination, affects and memories, which pervade social life, history and the life of the soul, play a significant role in the emergence of each painting and work on paper.
His practice translates these layers, dismissing the formal division between abstract and figurative, into the materiality of paint. The emotional dynamics of colour and how to contain and give form to what seems to evade representation are central to the work.
Figures and fragmented narratives in the paintings constellate multiple polarities and also, often echoing mythologies, ideological postures prevalent today. He incorporates these into ‘inscapes’, partly inspired by classical landscape painting.
Von Brasch finds parallels to his approach in Renaissance illuminations in alchemical manuscripts and quotes them indirectly in his work. This symbolic alchemical imagery addresses journeys of identities and evolution of consciousness while proposing transformative ways of working with conflict and diversity. Von Brasch’s interest here is to find new painterly ways to speak about these subjects, without referring literally to the ancient alchemical imagery.
A dialogue with Baroque, mythological and contemporary painting, which addresses deeper imaginal layers of identity, allows him to be part of an ongoing living tradition.
German-British painter Marius von Brasch received his MA with distinction from Winchester School of Art (Uni of Southampton) where he also completed his practice-based PhD, both in Fine Art Painting. He was awarded the Abbey Fellowship in Painting at The British School in Rome in 2013.
He has a background in psychotherapy and literature and teaches experiential approaches to painting as well as courses on art and literature. He works from his studio in Rookley, Isle of Wight. His work is in the Priseman Seabrook Collection, the University of Essex Modern and Contemporary British Art Collection and private collections. Marius von Brasch is represented by Jenn Singer Gallery.