Artwork
Dave (David H.) Brown was born in Jersey City in 1899 and grew up in Montclair. His formal education stopped at the eighth grade when he went to work as a clerk typist (who had to supply his own typewriter!) for the Erie-Lackawanna Railroad. As a young man he published poetry in the New York newspapers and kept beautiful, ornately decorated reading journals but never showed any particular interest in art. He worked in the textile industry, mainly as a purchasing agent, and only when he retired and took a painting class at his local high school did he discover a talent which became a passion.
Essentially self-taught but never interested in providing yet another Retired Amateurs Still Life, he developed some unique methods on his own, building up and shaping canvases, embellishing vases and embossing words on wood blocks. He made lively, witty assemblages out of the detritus of New York dozens of womens acrylic heels, nuts and bolts from disassembled machines, the logos of abandoned cars. (He kept a screwdriver in his pocket for those serendipitous catches.) He kept a studio in Chelsea for a few years, crammed with these findings, and showed his work wherever he could.
Dave and his wife Blossom moved to Florida in 1972, which did not prove a fertile ground for his imagination, which had thrived on the marvelous miscellany of the city. He died in 1991. He would be thrilled to see his work in his grandson's restaurant.
~ Rosellen Brown
