Downtown Los Angeles’ Corey Helford Gallery is proud to present the highly-anticipated solo exhibition by adored Southern California artist Brandi Milne, one of the leading artists in the contemporary art scene. Three years in the making and kicking off the holiday season at CHG, Everything I Ever Was opens on Saturday, October 29th from 7:00 pm – 11:00 pm in the Main Gallery and will be on view through December 3rd.
Growing up in Anaheim, California in the late 1970s/early 80s, Milne's surrounding world of classic cartoons, toys, candy, Disneyland, and joyous family holidays fascinated and deeply influenced her young imagination. Self-taught and emotionally driven, Milne’s pop-surrealist, acrylic paintings depict a uniquely surreal world that is undeniably hers and speak of love, loss, pain, and heartbreak, underneath a beautiful, candy-coated surface ? a combination that has led to a career spanning over 20 years and her work being celebrated around the world.
In this collection of all new works, spanning many themes, we look on as a forlorn and whimsical enchantress veiled in lace (seen above) plays a candy-colored accordion to an audience of adoring woodland fans, while in another very personal piece to Milne, we spy a hauntingly beautiful skeletal ghost-like banshee who is “running and searching and nothing is making sense…but she’s still going.” In another, we find a blue frosted elephant (seen above) inspired by an ornament she secretly plucked off a branch of her childhood Christmas tree. With all her works, you’re sure to find little surprises at every corner of the canvas like a musically inclined grasshopper who plays not his wings, but a tiny piano as he serenades the other cast of dreamlike characters in attendance.
Regarding the show, Milne shares, “A collection of surreal spun tales laced with the cold hard truth about what it feels like to be fully human ? Everything I Ever Was is my wild, bright, blazing human expression. To create these works, I dove deeply into the vivid world that lives within my imagination. I let my subconscious be my guide, as the subconscious is the womb of creation. The belly of these pieces hold my joy, my sorrow, my tenderness, and my grief. They hold my fear, my loneliness, as well as my love and my light.” Adding, “I offer these new images to my fellow humans in hopes that they can connect to the pure wonder within themselves. We are all connected by this beautiful thing we call humanity, and we need it now more than ever.”
Everything I Ever Was marks Milne’s fifth solo show at CHG, following 2017’s massively popular Once Upon A Quiet Kingdom, and opens on October 29th alongside a solo show from Nicoletta Ceccoli, titled Handle With Care, in Gallery 3.
