John Brosio 2

I was very excited to see new work on the website of John Brosio, whose work I posted back in November 2008. What's even more exciting is to see an artist tackling new material without missing a brushstroke of the quality that made his earlier work so powerful. Ruts are powerful things. When an artist gets really good at something there are all kinds of pressures to just stick to that one thing. And John Brosio had created an extraordinary body of work depicting the power and eerie beauty of tornadoes. There's really nothing else out there quite like them. But I don't suppose he really wanted to be known only as the tornado guy for the rest of his life. Earlier pieces had hinted at other directions and a few humorous figure studies indicated the itch to move on. Here's some of what he's posted so far. There's a pop-surrealist bent to the "Fatigue" paintings, but he tackles them with his masterful realist technique leaving all the eye-winking irony behind, so that one is simply left with a sense of wonder. That, after all, seems to be the theme that runs through most of his work; awe and amazement at the bizarre and unlikely world that surrounds us.
I really recommend spending a little time looking through the galleries on his website. It is very difficult to single out individual pieces for attention above the others.
www.johnbrosio.com



















"Fatigue" 48" x 60" 2009






















"Two Earthlings" 48" x 48" 2009


















"Fatigue 2" 36" x 48" 2009

and here's some of those tornadoes I mentioned:





















"Jerk in a Field" 36" x 29" 2008




















"Rapture" 72" x 84" 2006



















"Edge of Town 8" 35" x 42" 2007