Bryan Robertson
Catalogue Introduction to the exhibition Christopher Le Brun Paintings 1991-1994 at Marlborough Fine Art London 1994.
Bryan Robertson and Christopher Le Brun
Interview. Lindos, Rhodes. April 1997 and January 1998.
Caroline Collier
Exhibition review. Christopher Le Brun at Nigel Greenwood, London. Flash Art no.124 October/November 1985
Charles Saumarez Smith. Christopher Le Brun
Introduction to the monograph Christopher Le Brun Booth-Clibborn Editions 2001
Christopher Le Brun and Cecilia Powell
Constructive, Investigative and Truthful. Christopher Le Brun interviewed by Cecilia Powell on J.M.W. Turner and Watercolour. Published in the Turner Society News August 2006.
Christopher Le Brun. Giorgio Morandi
This essay was published in the catalogue for the exhibition 'Giorgio Morandi Etchings' at the Tate Gallery in 1992.
Christopher Le Brun. Representation
Paper delivered to the Royal Academy Forum. Published by Architectural Review November 2004
Donald Kuspit
Exhibition review. Christopher Le Brun at Sperone Westwater, New York. " ..the Watteau of the new expressionism..." Art Forum vol.XXVII, no.1, September 1988, p.136
Ebbsfleet Landmark
Artist statement and description of the proposal for a 50 metre high sculpture.
Eileen Myles.
Exhibition review. Christopher Le Brun at Sperone Westwater. Art in America, December 1988, p.154
John Aiken. Paradox and Modernity
Written for issue no.4 of the Slade Magazine c.1999. John Aiken is the Slade Professor.
Jonathan Glancey. A Chip off the Old Block
Jonathan Glancey on how a sculpture by Christopher Le Brun became the template for the office of the future. Published in The Guardian, 8th March 2004
Mario Cutajar. Fade into Darkness
Christopher Le Brun at the Art Center College of Design and L.A. Louver Gallery. Review. Artsweek March 1993.
Mark Francis. Interview with Christopher Le Brun
Fig-1, 50 projects in 50 weeks. 2000
Norbert Messler
Review of the exhibition at Rudolf Zwirner, Cologne. Artscribe International 1988.
Patrick Elliott. Four Riders
From Contemporary British Art in Print. Booth-Clibborn Editions 1995
Patrick Elliott. Seven Lithographs
From Contemporary British Art in Print Booth-Clibborn Editions 1995
Patrick Elliott. The Wagner Prints
From Contemporary British Art in Print. Booth-Clibborn Editions 1995
Stuart Morgan
Exhibition review. Christopher Le Brun at the Nigel Greenwood Gallery. Art Forum November 1985.
Tony Godfrey. Finding the Figure in the Landscape
Christopher Le Brun and his recent work. Catalogue essay . Arnolfini Gallery 1984
John Aiken. Paradox and Modernity
Written for issue no.4 of the Slade Magazine c.1999. John Aiken is the Slade Professor.
Christopher Le Brun studied painting at the Slade from 1970 to 1974 before moving on to graduate study at Chelsea school of Art. The Slade Professor at the time was Sir William Coldstream and the School had a very well established reputation as a distinguished school of painting.
Only two years before Le Brun began his undergraduate course a major development had occurred at the Slade with the formal introduction of postgraduate study. the new dynamic created by a large number of graduate students was having a profound influence on the School. Paradoxically, the Slade, whose reputation was generally misrepresented as a singular approach to the making of art (i.e. the perceptual study of the figure in painting), was thoroughly engaged with a debate about the role of art in society, and deeply politicised. Diversity of opinion and the influence of a wide range of newly appointed part-time and visiting staff produced a studio system that generated distinct areas of interest. These areas reflected the strongly held views of the articulate and determined individuals who taught in them. staff included John Stezaker, Victor Burgin, Stuart Brisley, Bernard Cohen, Euan Uglow, Tess Jaray, Noel Forster, John Hoyland and Malcolm Hughes.
In this highly politicised arena of diverse approaches to making and discussing art, students were inevitably forced to make choices and determine where they might best belong. In some senses a tribal or some would say, even a gang mentality existed. Christopher Le Brun opted for a route that he has maintained and successfully developed over the last thirty years - a celebration and investigation into the nature of what painting is and can be. In this sense his time at the Slade had a strong influence in developing an independent position for himself as an artist, by identifying his field of study and pushing it forward in a determined, informed and single-minded way. The lighter touch, in terms of modernity and undoubtedly 'trendier' Chelsea experience, opened up a more expansive and generous spirit in the work and allowed a poetic sensibility to come to the fore.
The determination to follow his own instinct as an artist and not to confine his work within the narrow parameters of belonging to a particular ideological group, ironically made his work more accessible to an international audience. British art had locked itself into a distinctive but generally unjoyous series of increasingly narrow areas of activity, while the highly energetic and exuberant work of the Italian Trans Avant Guard and New German Expressionism was immediately and warmly embraced by an eager art market.
Post-modernity had arrived and the work of Christopher Le Brun, which exhibited a strong english sensibility and revealed genuine scholarship in his research and knowledge, paradoxically and providentially fell within the orbit of this new internationally based spirit in painting.
Le Brun's large canvases reflected grand themes and utilised highly symbolic imagery. He employed a rich and varied palette and painted with an intensity that managed to somehow embrace subtlety and gusto simultaneously. These paintings were highly successful internationally and enjoyed wide critical acclaim. they were included in many of the most influential exhibitions of the early 1980's including Zeitgeist at the Gropius Bau in Berlin, 1982, New Art at the Tate Gallery, 1983, and An International Survey of Recent Painting and Sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, 1984.
Christopher Le Brun has continued to question and develop his relationship with the painted image. The subject of painting is his muse and it is his deep understanding of, and curiosity about his subject that drives him to produce work which resonates with authority and ambition.
