Maquette For The Last Hatted Autocrat ,2005
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Notes : David Brown’s later work moved further away from the more explicitly South African political concerns and allegorical figures which characterised his work in the 80s and 90s. Certain elements remain constant – an absurdist sense of humour, a keen sense of the observation of human foible, and a mastery of technique – but this rare appearance on auction of a maquette for a completed commission, illustrates the distance Brown’s work travelled.The maquette dates to somewhat earlier – sometime in the early 90s - than the finished bronze, which was commissioned by a private collector in Belgium, and is installed on top of a World War 2 bunker there. The expansive gesture of the figure in the maquette remains, however, as does its precarious position on top of an elaborate structure. The political allegory of the figure is perhaps that of the hubris of this autocrat, doomed to fall from his perch – which Brown had just witnessed in the fall of apartheid. The maquette has more in common as a character with contemporary sculptures such as those in Dialogue at the Dogwatch (1995). The development of the figure from maquette to finished commission marks a shift in the place of the autocrat from a specific political instance in South Africa, to a generalised condition – perhaps that of the Western patriarchy, shot through with violence. The autocratic allegory and the satirical intent, however, are constant in both figures.The presence of the maquette on auction is therefore of historical as well as aesthetic interest, in terms of the artist’s own development and that of the political trajectory of the world in which he worked.
James Sey
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