Brandon Owen — Of All the Things I Have Ever Known
February 9 – 28, 2023 | Presented in conjunction with Vaughn Art Agency + Gallery, Austin TX
There's a particular kind of artist that stops you mid-scroll — not because they're doing something loud, but because something about their work feels genuinely new. Brandon Owen is that artist for me, and I'm beyond excited that Western Gallery is bringing his first major solo exhibition to Austin this February.
Of All the Things I've Ever Known opens Thursday, February 9th at Vaughn Art Agency + Gallery on Thornton Road, and runs through the end of the month. Owen will be there in person for the opening reception (6–9pm), joined by musician Cactus Lee, Alvies Boots, Soto Vino wines, and Lone Star beer. RSVP here.
Who is Brandon Owen?
Brandon grew up in California around working cowboys — not the romanticized kind, but the real, dusty, boots-on-the-ground kind. But it wasn't until he picked up a skateboard as a teenager that he started making art. The graphic nature and punk DIY ethos of skate culture shaped him early, and he eventually parlayed that into a career in Nashville designing visuals for major label country records.
At some point, the corporate work wasn't enough. He started making room for fine art — work made without a client's brief or a brand's approval — and that's when the threads of his life started weaving together in interesting ways. Cowboys and horses found their way back onto the canvas, rendered in a Banksy-esque stencil approach, with an intuitive scribble energy that creates something genuinely new: work that speaks to the urban cowboy who grew up on Warhol and Banksy rather than Remington and Russell.
He found an audience quickly on Instagram. And then, this past December, he became a father — and everything shifted.
"Prepping for the birth of our daughter changed my thinking about why I do things. Once I held her, things felt totally different. Now I want to be more delicate and more precise with what I am trying to accomplish. I'm more concerned with making meaningful and interesting pieces."
The Exhibition
The title, Of All the Things I've Ever Known, is personal — it nods to the enormity of becoming a parent, but it also describes the breadth of what's in this show. Owen is working across a remarkable range of media: large mixed media works on canvas and paper, experimental wood reliefs, painted cowboy boots, quilts, CNC-cut wall pieces. It's a body of work that pulls from the material culture of the South and the Old West without ever feeling like nostalgia.
What makes it work is Owen's instinct for productive contradiction — the tension between subject and medium, between craft and naivité, between where he came from and where he's going.
"I'm excited to lean into playing with meanings and norms of pieces. Pulling from my whole lifetime of experiences, living in the south and the west, I'm taking one medium that may be reminiscent or appear as one thing but using it in an unexpected way that makes total sense to me."
"Of All The Things I Have Ever Known references my life; where I am now is better than all of the things I have ever known. And using techniques, inspirations and mediums that I have learned throughout my life, I am making art from all of the things I have ever known."
Come See It
Of All the Things I've Ever Known is on view February 9–28 at Vaughn Art Agency + Gallery, 2307 Thornton Rd. #112, Austin, TX 78704. Works are also available to view and collect online at western.gallery.
Opening reception: Thursday, February 9, 2023, 6–9pm.
This exhibition is presented by Western Gallery in conjunction with Vaughn Art Agency + Gallery. Thank you to Ashley Nussbaum and Rachel Drake at Vaughn for being such great partners in bringing Brandon's work to Austin.
