CAN Journal | Motion Arrested: Justin Brennan at HEDGE

Velocity stands still in the portraits and interiors by Justin Brennan in his solo show, Wide-Eyed, on view at HEDGE Gallery until June 30, 2023.

There’s flurry all awry here, in the unfinished movement of living. Portraits of the famous and not-famous gaze right back atcha, gallery-goer, triumphant in their purples and teals and blues and peaches. These armatures of color are dispatched in wide swathes of brush strokes that blur and wipe and blend. They build horizontal barriers of out of pieces of faces in which the eyes, always the eyes, remain static and clear and penetrating.

Remember the glitches of Max Headroom? These are his children, with the added intensity of perception. Capturing the person is a tricky number, and approximation always blurs.