FACE VALUE
Above: The Homeless
Irishman “Neptune” by
Don McCullin, London,
1971 and (right) Erdem
by Jason Brooks, 2017,
122 × 152.6cm.
Opposite: Brooks and
McCullin at Marlborough
Gallery, New York, 2015© DON MCCULLIN / CONTACT PRESS IMAGES IRISHMAN; COURTESY OF THE ARTIST AND MARLBOROUGH GALLERY, NEW YORK AND LONDON ERDEMand the creative process (“Holidays are
a problem,” says Brooks. “I’m constantly
struggling with the idea of wasting
time—plus, I’m physically too big to be
comfortable in planes”), and despite
Don’s claims that nobody could ll the
hole left by Mark Shand’s untimely death
some six years ago, a mutual admiration
society was born. The sense of solidarity
as observers and outsiders “married”
to plugged-in editors is indeed fanned
by long phone calls and the occasional
holiday. Both men work alone for hours
in their studio/darkroom and, in Don’s
case, an old-fashioned conversation on
the landline oers welcome respite.
At celebrity parties for Harper’s
Bazaar, and later for Porter magazine,
where I followed Lucy as a senior
editor, Don and Jason struck an odd
pairing of bystanders: the imposing,detached igure of
Brooks, immaculately
be-suited, standing head
and shoulders above the
quiet, rugged silver-fox
octogenarian.
On an artistic level, they
are united in their rejection
of the frenzied social
media age that is hung up
on celebrity culture with its compulsion
to airbrush reality. At 84, Don’s refusal
to switch on a computer or engage in
any digital form of communication
is perhaps unsurprising. But Brooks
doesn’t get it either, as he believes that
his work doesn’t convert or translate well
onto a screen. “Instagram simply attens
out the world,” he explains. Whether
creating a portrait, still life or landscape,
Brooks’ textured painterliness, with itsintellectual referencing of past masters,
his command of a multi-disciplinary
process and materials from airbrush to
trompe l’oeil, demands you stand closer,
look and look again, to re-evaluate
what it is that you think you see. The
seemingly artless drip of paint, for
instance, may not be a drip at all, but a
trompe l’oeil version of a drip—nothing
is what it seems.
Brooks’ striking portraits—giant
monochrome acrylics on watercolour
paper—of people he calls his favourite
visionaries, including Sir Terence
Conran, Erdem or Kate Moss, are
presented with all their pores and aws,
inviting you to “see” the person behind
the mask that is generally presented
to the world. Brooks explains, “I get
excited about what skin looks like close
up, the small imperfections.” He has
even collaborated in the design of the
new fashion gaming app DREST—the
brainchild of his partner Lucy, adding
freckles and asymmetrical features to
the avatars to make them look more real.
“For me, it is always about
not airbrushing out the
detail, the imperfection,
but about airbrushing
them in,” he says. “My
series of portraits, in
the end, are all about
celebrating what it means
to be human.”
“I don’t know about
human; I look almost
monster,” deadpans Don in reaction to his
portrait by Brooks for the artist’s much-
acclaimed Marlborough Gallery 2018
exhibition, The Subject is not the Subject.
It is a presentation of an informal, open-
shirted Don, his gaze direct, if weary
and wary. “I knew with Jason’s skill and
application he would uncover hidden
depths,” Don continued, “but here I
look dangerous, like someone you would
want to avoid. It makes me think, is thisVANITY FAIR ON ART NOVEMBER 201911-19-McCullin-Catherine-Fairweather.indd 62 24/09/2019 10:08
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