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Ad Code: 3
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from Auction House Records.
LEVIATHAN, PLAYBOY ILLUSTRATION, AUGUST 1970
Artwork images are copyright of the artist or assignee
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This biography from the Archives of AskART:
|  Painter, sculptor, and illustrator of commentary on human behavior,
Charles Bragg often injects his sense of humor and appreciation of
satire into his subjects, many which are cartoonish and seem half human
and half animal. He is also capable of depicting serious
subjects, ones that become poignant commentaries on the human condition.
Bragg has his studio in Los Angeles.
Source:
CharlesBragg.com
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These Notes from AskART represent the beginning of a possible future biography for this artist. Please click here if you wish to help in its development:
|  Note from Charles Ledray:
There is a good article published by the "New York Times" , 05 - 31 -
2002, Late Edition - Final, Section E, Column 3, Page 38. |
Biography from American Design Ltd.:
|  Charles Bragg portrays people, but he is not a figurative artist in the
plastic sense in which California artists have come to be known.
Bragg’s
concerns start with the narrative, even anecdotal, and he has created a
cast of characters who have lost their souls while acting out
depravities through tragicomic burlesques of morality and ethics.
Like a visual re-enactment of Gertrude Stein’s wonderful tale, “I Know
I'm a Queen Because I Wear a Crown,” his half-ass generals embody their
values in symbols of their acquisitiveness and vanity such as phony and
ornate medallions.
Bragg’s sinful universe is home to inept warmarkers frozen (clinically
but not without humanity) as they plot, plan, scheme, pose, and rattle
phallic sabres; they fumble and bristle beneath Prussian sashes and
Edwardian haircuts while breathing heavily through forced smiles
(psychosomatic asthma?).
Bragg’s bittersweet people are pompous,
voiceless, pious and cruel! They are completely believable, even
lovable; yet they are deranged, pretentious deathmongers and benevolent
despots with serious oral problems. They obviously overeat to
compensate for a lack of normal gratification. To sum up, they
are nice-looking, costumed 20th century cousins of Goya’s Saturn
devouring his son.
How dare Bragg make art of castrated cherubs
as generals, or gaily-draped ritualistic hypocrites as clergymen!
Who in hell does he think he is mirroring? It certainly doesn't
look like what we think of as white Christian America!—or then again,
does it? Holbein’s skeletons dance once again with reincarnate
joy!
Some viewers find so much to see in Bragg's work that one is apt to
forget what one is looking at, that is—a work composed of lush,
intuitive geometry modeled architectonically, using subtle renaissance
form. Genteel fantasies are woven into a complexity of visual
(image-idea) and psychological patterns in such a way that gestalt
experience occurs surprisingly often.
Though his scale is
intimate, Bragg's compositions are monumental enough to be translated
verbatim into mural scale. But enough about the physicality of
these works! The crux of the matter is simply that these
remarkably communicative expressions can be interprested as going
beyond storytelling into the real of affirming truth by exposing myths
and lies! Mean old Charley pricks pins into pomposity, not
people. He loves people, and his work transcends being merely
narrative because his work basically expresses conditions and values,
not itsy-bitsy genre situations. False prophets and soulless mythic
heroes are on their way out and Charley Bragg is recording Act III for
posterity.
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| ** If you discover credit omissions or have additional information to add, please let us know at registrar@AskART.com. |
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