Museum honors African-American painter Frederick J. Brown (1945-2012)

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS
By Ernest O. Britton

"The Ascension" (1982) by Frederick J. Brown.
Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Museum of Contemporary Religious Art in Saint Louis, Missouri is honoring the recent passing of American contemporary religious artist, Frederick Brown (1945-2012) with a special exhibition this summer through August. The museum's founding/director Terrence Dempsey was a friend of the artist, and the museum's collection includes an altarpiece created by the artist for the museum. Dempsey writes in the MOCRA blog, that he first encountered Brown’s work (above) at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan in the summer of 1985. "Its vitality energized one of Christianity’s most frequently depicted subjects, with the top frame barely able to contain the rising Christ figure who bears the physical signs of his crucifixion," said Dempsey.