May 21, 2026 • 37 mins
Maia found a painting in the garbage and took it home. But as it turned out, it wasn’t just any painting.
In this update, Kalila learns that she might have been looking at the painting all wrong.
You can sign up for our free newsletter at patreon.com/heavyweight
This episode was hosted and produced by Kalila Holt, along with Jonathan Goldstein. Our supervising producer is Stevie Lane. Production help from Damiano Marchetti. Special thanks to Sam Reisman, Emily Condon, Alex Blumberg, Lydia Polgreen, Marcy Flynn, Karl McCool, Caitlin Kenney, and Kayla Lattimore. The show was mixed by Bobby Lord. Music by Christine Fellows, John K Samson, Blue Dot Sessions, Michael Hearst, Sun Shapes, and Bobby Lord. Our theme song is by The Weakerthans courtesy of Epitaph Records. Mixing on this update by Sarah Bruguiere.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Pushkin.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Hi.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Hello, Today we're going to revisit an episode that I reported.
It's called Frederick J.
Speaker 4 (00:29):
Brown.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Oh yeah, okay.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
It's about art. It's about a painting.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Amazing. I love art, you know that, right?
Speaker 5 (00:37):
Yeah, you're always talking about how much you love art?
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Is that true?
Speaker 6 (00:40):
No?
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Oh, I don't you want to become one of those
art bores. Where are we talking about like fine art?
Speaker 5 (00:45):
Because I thought we were talking about fine art.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
There's all kinds of different art.
Speaker 5 (00:49):
Well, sure, this is art in a way. This conversation
we're having right now.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Well, let's not get crazy.
Speaker 3 (00:56):
I feel like our real dilettante around art. But I
do like it.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
You like it?
Speaker 2 (01:00):
You wouldn't say you love it.
Speaker 5 (01:02):
I just don't know that I'm knowledgeable enough.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
You don't have to be.
Speaker 5 (01:05):
Okay, then I guess I love it.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
Who do you think loves it more?
Speaker 7 (01:08):
Me?
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Or you?
Speaker 5 (01:09):
Probably?
Speaker 7 (01:09):
You?
Speaker 2 (01:10):
Really?
Speaker 5 (01:11):
Maybe?
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Just because of this is going to sound werud, but
you're added years of experience.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Sure, I've had a lot of time of aggling art.
You know, you might be a surprised to learn that
a person like myself, I'm not much of an art
snob in the sense that I believe that everybody possesses
artistic and creative ability.
Speaker 5 (01:35):
Well that's beautiful.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Now I'm off my high horse. I'm going to get
on my low horse, my show pony, and away we go.
Speaker 5 (01:47):
Away we go.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
Do you know whose catchphrase that was? No a pilot,
Jackie Gleeson?
Speaker 5 (01:53):
Oh? All right, well, away we go?
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Indeed?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Oh but first a word from our sponsors.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
Every Friday night during the pandemic, I'd get on a
Google hangout with a group of my boyfriend's friends and
we'd all play Mario Kart.
Speaker 7 (02:20):
Can remind you had a sixteen spread?
Speaker 8 (02:22):
Again?
Speaker 7 (02:22):
There was no pam six races.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
These Mario Kart sessions started back in the days when
we could barely leave the house due to COVID restrictions,
so it felt like an escape to log on to
carelessly karine in a small car or kart if you will,
through a gold mine or off a waterfall. In those
dark days, a few minutes on Mount Warrio was the
closest thing I could get.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
To a vacation.
Speaker 9 (02:47):
Right, let's be bad.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
That being said, I also found these Mario Kart hangouts
deeply intimidating, because I'm not.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
Good at Mario Kart.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
My gameplay mostly sounds like this, no, no, or this.
Along with the Mario karting, there was also non Mario chatting.
Speaker 6 (03:11):
On Instagram.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
Believe birthday and chatting of any kind is another thing
I'm not good at. Every so often, I'd weigh in
with something like pretty crazy. This was essentially the extent
of my engagement until the night Maya told us about
the painting. Maya found the painting sitting in a pile
(03:33):
of trash on the sidewalk, and it grabbed her instantly.
It was only later, when she took it home that
she saw the artist's signature, Frederick J.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
Brown.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
Although Maya works in art, the name was unfamiliar to her,
so she googled him, and what popped up was a
lengthy New York Times obituary from twenty twelve, praising Brown's
work and citing Willem du Kooning as an early mentor. Brown,
it turned out, was an acclaimed black artist known for
his portraits of jazz and blues musicians. He had work
(04:05):
in the Smithsonian. As Maya made her way through his biogic,
she slowly realized that the painting she'd been so instinctively
drawn to was actually the work of an important artist,
and so Maya was left wondering, how did Brown's painting
end up in the trash?
Speaker 5 (04:30):
Oh very regal building.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
On a cold Friday afternoon, I pay Maya visit her
Brooklyn apartment building to follow up and learn more. And
who knows, maybe my boyfriend's friend can simply become a friend. Oh,
very like regal building.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
I feel like.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
My irl chatting is truly no better than my Mario
Kart chatting, same as it is. Yeah, what I couldn't
see on the small square of our Mario Kart calls
was that every surface of Maya's apartment is covered art.
Not only has Maya worked in the art world for
many years at galleries art publishers, her husband, Wes, is
(05:16):
also an artist himself. He even proposed to Maya on
the steps of the met There's really only one spot
in their apartment that's empty, a blank wall above the couch.
They'd been waiting year after year for the perfect work
of art to hang there, and now with the discovery
of the Frederick J. Brown painting, they knew they'd found it.
(05:37):
Maya says she spotted the painting while heading home from
a COVID test. It was gigantic, and she still had
a mile to walk. She knew it didn't really make
sense to take it with her, but she couldn't walk
away from it either.
Speaker 10 (05:50):
I just kept going back to it. It just was
different from all of the other paintings I've seen. It
just really kind of grabbed me, and I started trying
to get it out of the.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Trash, clutching the huge painting to her body. Maya awkwardly
walk the mile home.
Speaker 10 (06:10):
There's like a little garbage juice at the bottom and
a little dust at the top, and I was walking.
I wouldn't let it sit on the ground. I know
I had probably been on the street all day, but
I didn't want it to be on the street anymore.
(06:31):
It is nearly as long as I am tall, and
I'm by four, lots of color and patterns.
Speaker 3 (06:38):
Despite my fondness for the audio medium, it fails to
translate the force of Brown's painting. It's not as easily
encapsulated as say the Mona Lisa Smiling Woman or American
Gothic unsmiling woman and man. It's mostly abstract, but then
there are these tiny spots with recognizable figures you.
Speaker 10 (06:59):
Can see faces, and there's these horizontal bands that sort
of organize the composition.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
Admiring the painting with Maya, it makes me feel like
I'm at a fancy party in drawing or jerves, but
also panicked that I have nothing intelligent to say.
Speaker 5 (07:16):
That kind of looks like a seven.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
The painting feels like a stained glass cabinet full of curios.
It feels like a quilt if a quilt weren't made
of fabric, but a fields and buildings and people rushing
to work. It feels like a packed room where everybody's dancing.
I asked Maya to show me where she first found
the painting, and so we hit the streets to return
to the scene of the trash.
Speaker 5 (07:41):
So we walk, Yeah, let's walk.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
We take a walk, as friends often do. Maya tells
me the painting was in the trash with a bunch
of other miscellaneous stuff, a TJ Max planter, a stained
toy chest. Whoever disposed of it was probably moving. Maybe
a neighbor can tell us who might have moved in
the last couple months. But whereas I was picturing a
(08:06):
small building with just a few buzzers to ring, it
turns out. The trash heap was actually in front of
a public housing complex, fourteen stories high, taking up a
whole block. We loiter by the building's entrance and I
try to catch people as they're going in or out.
(08:28):
Can I ask you something weird and ask you a
weird question?
Speaker 1 (08:30):
Anyone who moved out?
Speaker 3 (08:31):
Like in It's just about a painting that was left
outside of painting. Some of my friend found a painting
and she's trying to figure out, like what the deal is.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Nobody knows anything.
Speaker 3 (08:41):
No, all right, thank you, no, thank you?
Speaker 5 (08:44):
No, all right, thank you.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
There's a lot I don't understand about art, like why
are frames so expensive? But I can tell you this.
Paintings they have two sides. There's a side with all
the paint on it that people are always tripping over
each other to talk about. But then there's the other side,
the second or backside.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
If you will, do.
Speaker 10 (09:12):
You want to water, tear or anything?
Speaker 1 (09:14):
Or water would be great.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
And back in Maya's apartment, she explains that on this
backside or dari are side, there's another clue. She and
West were cleaning the painting off, getting it ready to
hang on the wall when they saw it lightly Scrawled
on the back of the canvas was an inscription.
Speaker 10 (09:33):
Painted nineteen seventy nine December title Genesis two Love, Happy
Birthday from Frederick to Lowry Simms, and then he signed
it and dated it in nineteen seventy nine.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
Maya may not have known the name Frederick Brown, but
she knew the name Lowry Simms quite well. Larry was
the president of the Studio Museum in Harlem, and before
that she'd been the first black curator at the Metropolitan
Museum of Art. She's now in her seventies and has
had decades of him packed on the art world.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
She's reached living legends status.
Speaker 10 (10:13):
You can't help but be like, oh, okay, yeah, should
I have not used a paper towel to clean this?
Speaker 3 (10:22):
The way Maya sees it, if you find something with
someone else's name on it, whether that's a wallet, a cat,
or a painting, you try to give it back to them.
And so she wants to return the painting to its
rightful owner, Lowry Simms. And once we find her, maybe
Lowry can help piece together how the painting ended up
in the garbage. I would like love to help try
(10:45):
and get in touch.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
With this person.
Speaker 9 (10:47):
Yes, please.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
Okay, my garbage hunting an abject failure, but my people
hunting that's going to be an abject success. I can't
find an email address for Lowry, so I do what
we all do when we want to pester someone more
important than we are.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
I send a message on LinkedIn.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
I explain that I have a painting I think belongs
to her, but perhaps fearing I'm running some sort of
con where I trade paintings for Social Security numbers, Lowry doesn't.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Respond, Hi, how are you?
Speaker 5 (11:26):
I need some.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
Sort of inroad.
Speaker 3 (11:28):
So I contact an artist named Chloe Bass, who's worked
with Lowry.
Speaker 10 (11:32):
I don't know why she would even need LinkedIn, it's
like her career is very well stablished.
Speaker 3 (11:39):
Chloe is also confused by how the painting ended up
in the trash. She says Lowry can't have been the
one to throw it away because Lowry doesn't live in
Brooklyn and never has. Chloe agrees to reach out to
her on my behalf and now that the request isn't
coming from Rando on LinkedIn, but Aranda, who knows Chloe Bass,
Lowry responds, we have a few back and forths over email.
(12:02):
I'm hoping to schedule a time for us to talk
on the phone, but Lowry is reluctant. She tells me
she doesn't want to talk unless she can see a
photo of the painting first. So I send her a photo,
saying I'd be curious if she recognizes Genesis Too, and
equally curious if she doesn't. Who knows. Maybe Brown's gift
of the painting never even reached her. The next morning,
(12:24):
Lowry writes back quote intriguing period That is the extent
of her email, and after that her correspondence comes to
a halt. Intriguing period. What did Lowry Simms's email mean.
(13:05):
It's not the response you'd expect of someone recognizing a beloved,
long lost painting. I start to wonder if maybe the
painting is a fake. Genesis Too doesn't look like any
of the other Frederick Brown paintings I've seen online. Maybe
Lowry's intriguing means an intriguing forgery. So I contact Frederick
Brown's trust. I figure they'll know best if the painting's
(13:27):
really his, and five days later I get confirmation that
the painting is legit. I receive a call from a
man named Bentley, who teaches at Fordham and is a
PhD candidate at the NYU Institute of Fine Arts. Bentley
is also it turns out, Frederick J. Brown's son.
Speaker 6 (13:46):
So here's the backstory. Yeah, the painting is part of
a larger painting called Genesis. Okay, that's in the collection
of the MET.
Speaker 7 (13:56):
Oh.
Speaker 5 (13:56):
WHOA, I didn't know that.
Speaker 6 (13:57):
So my dad became the youngest artist to be in
the collection of the Met at that time.
Speaker 7 (14:01):
So I get thirty three.
Speaker 6 (14:03):
Geez, let's say think that actually thirty.
Speaker 5 (14:05):
Four okay, and like on that right as a black artist.
Speaker 6 (14:13):
So Part one is at the MET.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Part one in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Part two
in a trash heap on a Brooklyn sidewalk. Bentley can't
wait to see his father's painting in person, so he
makes the drive from the Bronx to Maya's apartment in Brooklyn.
Speaker 6 (14:36):
Hi.
Speaker 3 (14:37):
And I'm hoping maybe Bentley will have insight into how
his dad's painting ended up in the trash. Should we
look at this painting and then maybe we can talk?
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Yeah, I love to.
Speaker 3 (14:53):
We all file into the living room, where Maya and
her husband West have propped the painting up against a
wall for Bentley to look at Bentley takes it in.
Speaker 6 (15:05):
This is amazing. It's just like, this makes me so happy.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
This is your first time.
Speaker 6 (15:12):
Yeah, I've never seen this.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
Bentley's dedicated years of his life to his father's work,
but he can't tell me how the painting ended up
in the trash. Before I reached out, he hadn't even
known Genesis Too existed. He bends down to get a
closer look.
Speaker 6 (15:30):
He didn't just stumble upon any piece within his catalog.
He stumbled upon a extremely important piece.
Speaker 3 (15:38):
It turns out the Genesis two was painted at the
moment when Brown was making a transition. That's why it
looks so different than anything else I'd seen online. Brown
was moving away from abstraction and towards more figurative work.
So among the shapes and lines, you see faces, an
airplane and.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
The fox figure, and it's like a self portrait.
Speaker 10 (15:59):
Do you know why your dad chose fox as a
symbol of representation.
Speaker 5 (16:04):
That's a good question.
Speaker 6 (16:05):
You have to be a fox to survive in the
art world as a black man, have to be. Everybody
looks at the fox as like like a nefarious sort
of character, right, But my dad kind of looked at
it as like, nah, that's just like, that's just a
cad that has to do whatever has to do to survive.
Speaker 3 (16:27):
Bentley tells us about his dad's life, about Frederick Brown's
childhood on the South Side of Chicago, how Brown's dad
managed to juke joint, hanging around blues musicians like Muddy Waters.
Early on, color made a strong impression on Brown. He
grew up mixing paint for the luxury cars his uncle
worked on. Later, Brown found work in the steel mills,
(16:48):
the colors of the hot metal burning their way into
his mind.
Speaker 6 (16:51):
Because he'd always talked about how like bright orange the
ingots were. You can see the bright orange in there.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Brown attended college in Illinois and eventually moved to New York,
where he set up shop in a huge loft on
Worcester Street and soho other artists and musicians are always
stopping by for Mayor Bearden, BB King, John Lennon, and
Yoko Ono. The Western Street loft is where Brown painted Genesis.
Speaker 6 (17:16):
So then after that he signed with Marlboro Gallery, and
so that was a big deal because Marlboro Gallery was
the hottest gallery at that time. We talk about like
Basque Yacht being the first black artist to sort of
make that break. It was really my dad, like, I'm
not even gonna hold you like I'm I'm not going
to I'm not going to sugarcoat it, you know.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
But while Bosquia went on to become a household name
selling paintings for millions of dollars, Frederick J. Brown did not.
So what happened. It turns out that even after signing
with Marlborough, Brown wasn't being shown and the way he
thought he should be.
Speaker 6 (17:52):
My dad kept trying to get like a retrospective and
couldn't get a retrospective anywhere.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
So Brown took matters into his own hands when a
Taiwanese artist named C. J. Yao invited him to come
to China. It was nineteen eighty eight and communist China
was just starting to culturally open up. Only one other
American artist, Robert Rauschenberg, had shown work in the country.
But together Brown and Yao decided, let's do a Frederick J.
(18:19):
Brown retrospective in China.
Speaker 6 (18:26):
And they decided to do it in the National Museum
of China, which like is on Tienamen Square and it's
like an insanely huge building.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
The museum had been filled with relative Chairman Mao and
the Communist Revolution. But all that was cleared out to
make room for one hundred Frederick J. Brown paintings.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
And he had a lot.
Speaker 6 (18:45):
I mean, he had sixty thousand people a day for
like thirty days.
Speaker 10 (18:51):
Wow.
Speaker 6 (18:53):
He had to go to China to have a red.
He had to go to China to be seen as
an American.
Speaker 3 (18:58):
Artist because in America, Brown was seen as a black artist.
And despite what he accomplished in China, when he returned
to the States, he hadn't earned any additional prestige.
Speaker 6 (19:11):
Instead, Marlborough was pissed that he did the show because
they did it without his without their consent. He took
out a loan to do it himself of half a
million dollars. He had no way of paying it back.
So that was like the beginning of I don't want
to say the end, but it was the beginning of
like a real hardship.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
Marlborough dropped him. The bank was trying to take all
his work, which he'd put up as collateral. He was
only able to save some paintings by erasing his name
entirely so the bank would think they weren't his. Other
paintings he hid in the walls of his Worcester Street loft.
(19:55):
Brown continued to paint for the rest of his life,
but he never regained that blue trip cachet from his
early career. He didn't become a name that a non
art person like me, or even an art person like
Maya would immediately recognize. Brown died of cancer in twenty twelve,
and ten years later, Bentley's frustrated that his father still
(20:15):
doesn't have his rightful place in the cannon.
Speaker 6 (20:18):
You go up to these people that are gatekeepers and
you plead your case. Most people are just like, eh, whatever,
there's not a market for it right now, right and
it's it's like, man, fuck you.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
It's the same story for a lot of black artists. Sure,
these gatekeepers want black art, Bentley says that they want
a particular kind of black art. They want art they
can look at and go, ah, yes, I get it.
This is about the politics of being black in America.
Speaker 6 (20:48):
When we think about black art or black artists, right,
we are very quick to add like a political tag
to the thing. I mean, I guess you could argue
that blackness in and of itself is a political thing.
But my dad was kind of much more of the
camp of like just like make art for art's sake.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
But purely aesthetic work by a black art. That's what
ends up in the garbage.
Speaker 6 (21:12):
It's such a painful feeling. It's such a yeah, painful
is the word. And such a painful feeling when you
know that, like you have such a special world and
people don't give a shit.
Speaker 5 (21:27):
What is I mean?
Speaker 3 (21:28):
Like if you have to describe, like what what that
special world was?
Speaker 6 (21:33):
Like?
Speaker 1 (21:33):
What how would you explain it?
Speaker 3 (21:35):
Bentley points at the painting still leaning against the wall?
Speaker 9 (21:39):
Is that right?
Speaker 2 (21:39):
There?
Speaker 6 (21:42):
So much color, so much emotion, so much beauty. You
you two recognized it. The beanting definitely called to me. Yeah,
I mean you rescued it right like, and it's like
a piece of my dad. It's like his energy, his
spirit is him. You know. That was my dad calling
(22:03):
out to you. That's what that was.
Speaker 7 (22:06):
Like.
Speaker 6 (22:06):
Yeah, don't let me go in the trash. Yeah, my
son lives not too far away. Don't let me go
in the trash.
Speaker 3 (22:27):
Well, Bentley was able to trace the path that led
Frederick Brown's work to the metaphorical trash heap. I'm still
wondering about the literal trash heap, the one on a
Brooklyn sidewalk, And so, of course I'm still wondering about
Larry Simms. It turns out Bentley knows Lowry well. The
two are even writing a book together. When I ask
(22:48):
Bentley about Lowry's aversion to speaking with me, he alludes
to some bad experiences she's had with journalists, but he
reassures me that he'll put in a good word. And
the next morning, Bentley calls to tell me that Lowry
is willing to talk. There's just one caveat. She doesn't
want to discuss how the painting wound up in the garbage.
(23:10):
It's hard for me to figure out why. And I
don't really know how to do an interview about a
painting that ended up in the trash without asking how
the painting ended up in the trash. So I crossed
my fingers that something might shift. Once we're on the phone,
Larry takes my call from her condo in Baltimore. She
(23:31):
tells me that she met Frederick Brown when she was
around thirty, a newly minted curator at the Met. As
a curator, Lowry's mission was to champion the work of
overlooked artists. Larry herself knew what it was like to
be overlooked.
Speaker 8 (23:45):
I mean I was in, you know, as this black
girl from Queens. I had a career nobody would have
expected at that time. I was in places where nobody
expected at the time. I mean I used to tell people.
One of the most amusing things for me was to
go to a collector on Park Avenue in the seventies
(24:07):
and get to the front door and Dorman would try
to sort of scoop me around to the service entrance
because they assumed it was a housekeeper or something, you know,
and new I'm you know, sends from the Metropolitan Museum.
You want to see the face change, you know, they go, oh,
(24:28):
you know. It was a struggle to get past the
ignorance about black artists.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Like once in the seventies Larry organized because a bit
of black art from the METS collection.
Speaker 8 (24:44):
And when we got the exhibition up, I was approached
by a journalist who said, I didn't even know they
were black artists. Now this is like nineteen seventy nine.
Come on, jeez, yeah, yeah, yeah, So I say, where
we've been around since the late eighteen.
Speaker 3 (25:00):
Hundred, hearing this story, it starts to make sense why
Lowry might have been reluctant to speak with me, a
white like journalists she's never met. In fact, when I
spoke with Bentley, he said Lowry had wanted him to
suss me out, to make sure that I was okay,
before she agreed to talk to me. Like his dad,
Bentley said, Lowry too has had to be a fox.
(25:30):
Larry and Brown's friendship endured for decades, starting in that
Worcester Street loft and lasting until Brown's death, And even
after he died, Lowry continued to engage with Brown's work.
Just last summer, she helped put together a big posthumous
show of his art at the Barry Campbell Gallery in Manhattan.
Like Bentley, she wants Brown to finally get his due.
Speaker 8 (25:51):
It's a regional work, you know, it's strong work. I'm
just hopeful that, you know, Frederick gets written into the
you know, the art lexicon in the way that he
needs to be.
Speaker 3 (26:06):
When I ask Lowry why this hasn't happened yet Bentley,
she cites the aftermath of the China trip, but she
also offers this.
Speaker 8 (26:14):
He sort of left New York at a crucial period
in his career, and he put the concerns of his
family first.
Speaker 3 (26:22):
And it's true. In the nineties, Brown left New York
for a town called Carefree, Arizona. A big factor in
that decision was his daughter's asthma. Brown knew the dry
desert heat would be good for her, and although money
was still tight, the family was happy out in Arizona.
Bentley recalls his dad attending his flag football games in
his signature White Brooks Brothers suit, sweating in the Arizona
(26:46):
son and dabbing his forehead with napkins. Well, some children
of famous artists remember locked studio doors. Bentley remembers his
dad's welcoming studio couch, where he'd flopped down after school
and talk about his day while his father painted. All
of which is to say Bentley remembers Brown as a
good dad. As Lowry and I talk, I do my
(27:14):
best to avoid the whole painting and the trash thing.
So we discussed her time at the met Brown's jazz portraits,
the similarities between Genesis one and two. But then, without prompting,
Lowry volunteers this, I.
Speaker 8 (27:29):
Mean, I sort of, like, you know, kind of figured
out that I probably gazed the painting to someone who
admired it. You know, I can't remember who because it
you know, because it was certainly too big for my
low apartment.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
As it turns out, Brown had painted Lowry Genesis two
as a thank you gift because she had been the
curator who bought Genesis one for the Mets collection. But
the painting was huge, and Lowry ran into the problem
that so many New Yorkers do. Living in a cramped
apartment on the Upper east Side, she just hadn't had
space for it. For Lowry, there was no blank wall
(28:05):
above the couch, just waiting for something to be hung.
She found Genesis to a good home with a friend
who loved it.
Speaker 8 (28:13):
And I think I told Fred, you know, like about it. Yeah,
how it ended up with Amya fined it? I don't know.
I just can't remember who I might have given it to.
Speaker 3 (28:24):
I suspect that Lowry might be trying to protect a friend.
Maybe that's why she had been reluctant to talk about
the painting's loss. Maybe Larry gave the painting to someone
who moved to a smaller apartment themselves, or maybe they
died or fell on hard times and decided to sell it.
Maybe it was regifted to someone else, or sold in
a state sale, or just lost in the general shuffle
(28:46):
of life. No matter what, the end result is the same. Ultimately,
someone looked at it thought this isn't worth keeping and
threw it away. All of that, it seems, was wrapped
up and Lowry's intriguing. Does it make you sad at
all to think of art just in the trash like that?
Speaker 8 (29:06):
Well, you know, there's a saying that ninety eight percent
of all the art created in the world since the
beginning is gone.
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Do you think like the best stuff somehow makes it through?
Speaker 5 (29:21):
Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 8 (29:23):
I think it's totally random. I mean, I guess that's
why we have museums, you know, because they can be
seen as places where these things can be safe. But
I mean this book that was happening now in the Ukraine,
you know, the palming museums and cultural sites. So I
think a lot of times it's just the luck of
the draw.
Speaker 3 (29:44):
Time is the most capricious of curators. A few weeks earlier,
when Bentley came by Maya's apartment, we all sat around
and talked for hours about art and family, and finally,
when it was time to go, Maya turned to Bentley
(30:07):
and said, I don't think the painting belongs with me.
I think it belongs somewhere else. Bentley's taller than Maya
and had no problem lifting up the canvas. He thanked
Maya warmly and carried Genesis two out the door to
his car. He'd serve as the paintings caretaker until Lowry
decided what she wanted to do. Can you tell me
(30:28):
sort of like, what's happening to it now? Do you
know where it's going?
Speaker 8 (30:33):
Yeah, it's been accepted by the Studio Museum as a donation.
Speaker 4 (30:37):
Oh that's great, and the donation will be from me,
from the estate of the artists, and from Maya.
Speaker 3 (30:48):
On a warm Friday afternoon, I pay Maya visit her
Regal apartment building.
Speaker 7 (30:55):
Hello.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
She and Wes are signing the paperwork to officially donate
the painting to the Studio Museum, and I'm here to
serve as a witness. Lowry and Bentley have both already signed.
Knowing how much Maya loves the painting, I thought giving
it up would be bittersweet, but she's in high spirits.
(31:17):
She likes the idea of Genesis too hanging in a museum.
That way, thousands of people will get to enjoy it.
We'll lean towards the plaque and read the name Frederick J. Brown.
Who knows what that name might mean to people in
the future, if time will strengthen Brown's legacy or wash
it away. But for now, we finish up the paperwork
(31:38):
and all cheers a shot at tequila to celebrate, as
friends often do.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Cheers thank you.
Speaker 3 (31:49):
On my way out, I noticed that the big wall
above Maya's couch is still blank.
Speaker 9 (32:16):
Now that the fernitures returning to its goodwill home, now
that the last month's rent is scheming with the damage
with pos take this moment to des.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
If we mentain, if we.
Speaker 9 (32:38):
Talk felt around from far to.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
From things that accidentally.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
Hello Jonathan Khalila, Yeah, Hi, Hi, what's going on?
Speaker 7 (33:02):
I'm in the studio museum at the moment.
Speaker 2 (33:05):
Oh thank god. When I heard you whispering like that,
I figured immediate that you were incarcerated somehow.
Speaker 7 (33:11):
Why would I need to whisper?
Speaker 2 (33:14):
Yeah, that's true.
Speaker 7 (33:15):
It would be more likely that I'd been kidnapped and
was secretly using a phone, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (33:20):
Like from the trunk of a car. Yeah, okay, few,
I'm so glad you're in a museum instead. Why are
you in a museum.
Speaker 7 (33:27):
I'm in a museum because the studio museum is where
Frederick J. Brown's painting Genesis. To end it up, the
painting is not up at the moment, but there are
a couple galleries dedicated to like cycling things out that
are in the permanent collection. Uh huh, so I imagine it
(33:48):
will hang in one of those galleries soon.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
Ah. So you think it's in a storage room.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
I guess.
Speaker 7 (33:55):
I don't really know how museums work, but yeah, they
must have some kind of art storage. Right.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
Well, here's your chance to find out. I'm going to
put you on assignment here. Okay, do you see any
any doors that say staff only or do not enter?
Speaker 7 (34:09):
I'm standing by one right now.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
Do you want to try the doorknob?
Speaker 7 (34:12):
Let me just see.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
Is it locked?
Speaker 7 (34:16):
Yeah? It's locked.
Speaker 2 (34:18):
Well, so much for our big art heist. Well how
does it feel? I guess to know that it's it's
in its rightful place, and you had you had a
hand in that.
Speaker 7 (34:28):
That's cool, actually, I mean, even though it's not up
right now, just to be like, oh, this is its
home and it's among all this other art, and like
there's a lot of people at the museum. Oh really,
I feel like people are going to be able to
come and appreciate it. Yeah. Yeah, I was going to say,
not to presume, but are you in front of a computer?
Speaker 2 (34:46):
I am?
Speaker 10 (34:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (34:47):
Would you like to go to the Studio Museum website
and look up Frederick J. Brown in the.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
Coluction Studio Museum Frederick. There we go. Let's see. Oh
he there's three of his works here.
Speaker 7 (35:03):
Oh nice?
Speaker 2 (35:05):
And here we are, yeah, Genesis two. And you know
what what it is? Vertical?
Speaker 7 (35:15):
I know I noticed that too. I was like, maybe
we were looking at it the wrong way.
Speaker 2 (35:20):
I think we were. Yeah, And honestly, looking at it
like this, it's like looking at a whole different painting.
It does the way you see it, I know, and
you know, in a way it kind of makes more sense.
Speaker 10 (35:34):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (35:35):
Huh.
Speaker 7 (35:36):
I am so serious how they even determined that, because
I feel like when I was looking at it with Bentley,
he also thought it went horizontally.
Speaker 2 (35:44):
He did.
Speaker 7 (35:45):
Yeah, And I did speak with Bentley recently too, and
he gave me some updates about what's going on with
his father's work.
Speaker 6 (35:56):
Of the updates and the major update though, is that
we do have a retrospective of his work.
Speaker 5 (36:02):
Oh you do.
Speaker 6 (36:03):
Yeah, it's going to be opening in twenty twenty eight.
Okay at the Phoenix our museum. Great and yeah again,
I just can't thank you enough for taking on the
story like it brought us so much publicity and then
you know, we had several major exhibitions after that.
Speaker 5 (36:23):
Oh that's great. Well, thank you Bentley for talking. It's
really nice to talk to you again.
Speaker 6 (36:28):
Thanks so much.
Speaker 5 (36:29):
Talk to you later, talk to you sad.
Speaker 2 (36:41):
Thanks to everyone who helped put this episode together. If
you haven't already heard, and I can't imagine how you haven't,
We've started a free newsletter, have you, Khi La Holt
heard about our free newsletter?
Speaker 8 (36:54):
Yes?
Speaker 5 (36:54):
In fact, I've I've written stuff in it.
Speaker 2 (36:56):
Oh that's going to look great on your resume. That
sounds like a threat. Are I fired?
Speaker 1 (37:03):
Not at all?
Speaker 2 (37:04):
I'm just saying, you know, kudos to you. That's a
publication right there. So all of which to say, go
to patreon dot com slash Heavyweight to sign up, and
we'll be back once again with another exciting update in
two weeks time.
Pushkin.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Hi.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Hello, Today we're going to revisit an episode that I reported.
It's called Frederick J.
Speaker 4 (00:29):
Brown.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Oh yeah, okay.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
It's about art. It's about a painting.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Amazing. I love art, you know that, right?
Speaker 5 (00:37):
Yeah, you're always talking about how much you love art?
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Is that true?
Speaker 6 (00:40):
No?
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Oh, I don't you want to become one of those
art bores. Where are we talking about like fine art?
Speaker 5 (00:45):
Because I thought we were talking about fine art.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
There's all kinds of different art.
Speaker 5 (00:49):
Well, sure, this is art in a way. This conversation
we're having right now.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Well, let's not get crazy.
Speaker 3 (00:56):
I feel like our real dilettante around art. But I
do like it.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
You like it?
Speaker 2 (01:00):
You wouldn't say you love it.
Speaker 5 (01:02):
I just don't know that I'm knowledgeable enough.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
You don't have to be.
Speaker 5 (01:05):
Okay, then I guess I love it.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
Who do you think loves it more?
Speaker 7 (01:08):
Me?
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Or you?
Speaker 5 (01:09):
Probably?
Speaker 7 (01:09):
You?
Speaker 2 (01:10):
Really?
Speaker 5 (01:11):
Maybe?
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Just because of this is going to sound werud, but
you're added years of experience.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Sure, I've had a lot of time of aggling art.
You know, you might be a surprised to learn that
a person like myself, I'm not much of an art
snob in the sense that I believe that everybody possesses
artistic and creative ability.
Speaker 5 (01:35):
Well that's beautiful.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
Now I'm off my high horse. I'm going to get
on my low horse, my show pony, and away we go.
Speaker 5 (01:47):
Away we go.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
Do you know whose catchphrase that was? No a pilot,
Jackie Gleeson?
Speaker 5 (01:53):
Oh? All right, well, away we go?
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Indeed?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Oh but first a word from our sponsors.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
Every Friday night during the pandemic, I'd get on a
Google hangout with a group of my boyfriend's friends and
we'd all play Mario Kart.
Speaker 7 (02:20):
Can remind you had a sixteen spread?
Speaker 8 (02:22):
Again?
Speaker 7 (02:22):
There was no pam six races.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
These Mario Kart sessions started back in the days when
we could barely leave the house due to COVID restrictions,
so it felt like an escape to log on to
carelessly karine in a small car or kart if you will,
through a gold mine or off a waterfall. In those
dark days, a few minutes on Mount Warrio was the
closest thing I could get.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
To a vacation.
Speaker 9 (02:47):
Right, let's be bad.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
That being said, I also found these Mario Kart hangouts
deeply intimidating, because I'm not.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
Good at Mario Kart.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
My gameplay mostly sounds like this, no, no, or this.
Along with the Mario karting, there was also non Mario chatting.
Speaker 6 (03:11):
On Instagram.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
Believe birthday and chatting of any kind is another thing
I'm not good at. Every so often, I'd weigh in
with something like pretty crazy. This was essentially the extent
of my engagement until the night Maya told us about
the painting. Maya found the painting sitting in a pile
(03:33):
of trash on the sidewalk, and it grabbed her instantly.
It was only later, when she took it home that
she saw the artist's signature, Frederick J.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
Brown.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
Although Maya works in art, the name was unfamiliar to her,
so she googled him, and what popped up was a
lengthy New York Times obituary from twenty twelve, praising Brown's
work and citing Willem du Kooning as an early mentor. Brown,
it turned out, was an acclaimed black artist known for
his portraits of jazz and blues musicians. He had work
(04:05):
in the Smithsonian. As Maya made her way through his biogic,
she slowly realized that the painting she'd been so instinctively
drawn to was actually the work of an important artist,
and so Maya was left wondering, how did Brown's painting
end up in the trash?
Speaker 5 (04:30):
Oh very regal building.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
On a cold Friday afternoon, I pay Maya visit her
Brooklyn apartment building to follow up and learn more. And
who knows, maybe my boyfriend's friend can simply become a friend. Oh,
very like regal building.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
I feel like.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
My irl chatting is truly no better than my Mario
Kart chatting, same as it is. Yeah, what I couldn't
see on the small square of our Mario Kart calls
was that every surface of Maya's apartment is covered art.
Not only has Maya worked in the art world for
many years at galleries art publishers, her husband, Wes, is
(05:16):
also an artist himself. He even proposed to Maya on
the steps of the met There's really only one spot
in their apartment that's empty, a blank wall above the couch.
They'd been waiting year after year for the perfect work
of art to hang there, and now with the discovery
of the Frederick J. Brown painting, they knew they'd found it.
(05:37):
Maya says she spotted the painting while heading home from
a COVID test. It was gigantic, and she still had
a mile to walk. She knew it didn't really make
sense to take it with her, but she couldn't walk
away from it either.
Speaker 10 (05:50):
I just kept going back to it. It just was
different from all of the other paintings I've seen. It
just really kind of grabbed me, and I started trying
to get it out of the.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Trash, clutching the huge painting to her body. Maya awkwardly
walk the mile home.
Speaker 10 (06:10):
There's like a little garbage juice at the bottom and
a little dust at the top, and I was walking.
I wouldn't let it sit on the ground. I know
I had probably been on the street all day, but
I didn't want it to be on the street anymore.
(06:31):
It is nearly as long as I am tall, and
I'm by four, lots of color and patterns.
Speaker 3 (06:38):
Despite my fondness for the audio medium, it fails to
translate the force of Brown's painting. It's not as easily
encapsulated as say the Mona Lisa Smiling Woman or American
Gothic unsmiling woman and man. It's mostly abstract, but then
there are these tiny spots with recognizable figures you.
Speaker 10 (06:59):
Can see faces, and there's these horizontal bands that sort
of organize the composition.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
Admiring the painting with Maya, it makes me feel like
I'm at a fancy party in drawing or jerves, but
also panicked that I have nothing intelligent to say.
Speaker 5 (07:16):
That kind of looks like a seven.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
The painting feels like a stained glass cabinet full of curios.
It feels like a quilt if a quilt weren't made
of fabric, but a fields and buildings and people rushing
to work. It feels like a packed room where everybody's dancing.
I asked Maya to show me where she first found
the painting, and so we hit the streets to return
to the scene of the trash.
Speaker 5 (07:41):
So we walk, Yeah, let's walk.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
We take a walk, as friends often do. Maya tells
me the painting was in the trash with a bunch
of other miscellaneous stuff, a TJ Max planter, a stained
toy chest. Whoever disposed of it was probably moving. Maybe
a neighbor can tell us who might have moved in
the last couple months. But whereas I was picturing a
(08:06):
small building with just a few buzzers to ring, it
turns out. The trash heap was actually in front of
a public housing complex, fourteen stories high, taking up a
whole block. We loiter by the building's entrance and I
try to catch people as they're going in or out.
(08:28):
Can I ask you something weird and ask you a
weird question?
Speaker 1 (08:30):
Anyone who moved out?
Speaker 3 (08:31):
Like in It's just about a painting that was left
outside of painting. Some of my friend found a painting
and she's trying to figure out, like what the deal is.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Nobody knows anything.
Speaker 3 (08:41):
No, all right, thank you, no, thank you?
Speaker 5 (08:44):
No, all right, thank you.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
There's a lot I don't understand about art, like why
are frames so expensive? But I can tell you this.
Paintings they have two sides. There's a side with all
the paint on it that people are always tripping over
each other to talk about. But then there's the other side,
the second or backside.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
If you will, do.
Speaker 10 (09:12):
You want to water, tear or anything?
Speaker 1 (09:14):
Or water would be great.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
And back in Maya's apartment, she explains that on this
backside or dari are side, there's another clue. She and
West were cleaning the painting off, getting it ready to
hang on the wall when they saw it lightly Scrawled
on the back of the canvas was an inscription.
Speaker 10 (09:33):
Painted nineteen seventy nine December title Genesis two Love, Happy
Birthday from Frederick to Lowry Simms, and then he signed
it and dated it in nineteen seventy nine.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
Maya may not have known the name Frederick Brown, but
she knew the name Lowry Simms quite well. Larry was
the president of the Studio Museum in Harlem, and before
that she'd been the first black curator at the Metropolitan
Museum of Art. She's now in her seventies and has
had decades of him packed on the art world.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
She's reached living legends status.
Speaker 10 (10:13):
You can't help but be like, oh, okay, yeah, should
I have not used a paper towel to clean this?
Speaker 3 (10:22):
The way Maya sees it, if you find something with
someone else's name on it, whether that's a wallet, a cat,
or a painting, you try to give it back to them.
And so she wants to return the painting to its
rightful owner, Lowry Simms. And once we find her, maybe
Lowry can help piece together how the painting ended up
in the garbage. I would like love to help try
(10:45):
and get in touch.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
With this person.
Speaker 9 (10:47):
Yes, please.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
Okay, my garbage hunting an abject failure, but my people
hunting that's going to be an abject success. I can't
find an email address for Lowry, so I do what
we all do when we want to pester someone more
important than we are.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
I send a message on LinkedIn.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
I explain that I have a painting I think belongs
to her, but perhaps fearing I'm running some sort of
con where I trade paintings for Social Security numbers, Lowry doesn't.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Respond, Hi, how are you?
Speaker 5 (11:26):
I need some.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
Sort of inroad.
Speaker 3 (11:28):
So I contact an artist named Chloe Bass, who's worked
with Lowry.
Speaker 10 (11:32):
I don't know why she would even need LinkedIn, it's
like her career is very well stablished.
Speaker 3 (11:39):
Chloe is also confused by how the painting ended up
in the trash. She says Lowry can't have been the
one to throw it away because Lowry doesn't live in
Brooklyn and never has. Chloe agrees to reach out to
her on my behalf and now that the request isn't
coming from Rando on LinkedIn, but Aranda, who knows Chloe Bass,
Lowry responds, we have a few back and forths over email.
(12:02):
I'm hoping to schedule a time for us to talk
on the phone, but Lowry is reluctant. She tells me
she doesn't want to talk unless she can see a
photo of the painting first. So I send her a photo,
saying I'd be curious if she recognizes Genesis Too, and
equally curious if she doesn't. Who knows. Maybe Brown's gift
of the painting never even reached her. The next morning,
(12:24):
Lowry writes back quote intriguing period That is the extent
of her email, and after that her correspondence comes to
a halt. Intriguing period. What did Lowry Simms's email mean.
(13:05):
It's not the response you'd expect of someone recognizing a beloved,
long lost painting. I start to wonder if maybe the
painting is a fake. Genesis Too doesn't look like any
of the other Frederick Brown paintings I've seen online. Maybe
Lowry's intriguing means an intriguing forgery. So I contact Frederick
Brown's trust. I figure they'll know best if the painting's
(13:27):
really his, and five days later I get confirmation that
the painting is legit. I receive a call from a
man named Bentley, who teaches at Fordham and is a
PhD candidate at the NYU Institute of Fine Arts. Bentley
is also it turns out, Frederick J. Brown's son.
Speaker 6 (13:46):
So here's the backstory. Yeah, the painting is part of
a larger painting called Genesis. Okay, that's in the collection
of the MET.
Speaker 7 (13:56):
Oh.
Speaker 5 (13:56):
WHOA, I didn't know that.
Speaker 6 (13:57):
So my dad became the youngest artist to be in
the collection of the Met at that time.
Speaker 7 (14:01):
So I get thirty three.
Speaker 6 (14:03):
Geez, let's say think that actually thirty.
Speaker 5 (14:05):
Four okay, and like on that right as a black artist.
Speaker 6 (14:13):
So Part one is at the MET.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Part one in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Part two
in a trash heap on a Brooklyn sidewalk. Bentley can't
wait to see his father's painting in person, so he
makes the drive from the Bronx to Maya's apartment in Brooklyn.
Speaker 6 (14:36):
Hi.
Speaker 3 (14:37):
And I'm hoping maybe Bentley will have insight into how
his dad's painting ended up in the trash. Should we
look at this painting and then maybe we can talk?
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Yeah, I love to.
Speaker 3 (14:53):
We all file into the living room, where Maya and
her husband West have propped the painting up against a
wall for Bentley to look at Bentley takes it in.
Speaker 6 (15:05):
This is amazing. It's just like, this makes me so happy.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
This is your first time.
Speaker 6 (15:12):
Yeah, I've never seen this.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
Bentley's dedicated years of his life to his father's work,
but he can't tell me how the painting ended up
in the trash. Before I reached out, he hadn't even
known Genesis Too existed. He bends down to get a
closer look.
Speaker 6 (15:30):
He didn't just stumble upon any piece within his catalog.
He stumbled upon a extremely important piece.
Speaker 3 (15:38):
It turns out the Genesis two was painted at the
moment when Brown was making a transition. That's why it
looks so different than anything else I'd seen online. Brown
was moving away from abstraction and towards more figurative work.
So among the shapes and lines, you see faces, an
airplane and.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
The fox figure, and it's like a self portrait.
Speaker 10 (15:59):
Do you know why your dad chose fox as a
symbol of representation.
Speaker 5 (16:04):
That's a good question.
Speaker 6 (16:05):
You have to be a fox to survive in the
art world as a black man, have to be. Everybody
looks at the fox as like like a nefarious sort
of character, right, But my dad kind of looked at
it as like, nah, that's just like, that's just a
cad that has to do whatever has to do to survive.
Speaker 3 (16:27):
Bentley tells us about his dad's life, about Frederick Brown's
childhood on the South Side of Chicago, how Brown's dad
managed to juke joint, hanging around blues musicians like Muddy Waters.
Early on, color made a strong impression on Brown. He
grew up mixing paint for the luxury cars his uncle
worked on. Later, Brown found work in the steel mills,
(16:48):
the colors of the hot metal burning their way into
his mind.
Speaker 6 (16:51):
Because he'd always talked about how like bright orange the
ingots were. You can see the bright orange in there.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
Brown attended college in Illinois and eventually moved to New York,
where he set up shop in a huge loft on
Worcester Street and soho other artists and musicians are always
stopping by for Mayor Bearden, BB King, John Lennon, and
Yoko Ono. The Western Street loft is where Brown painted Genesis.
Speaker 6 (17:16):
So then after that he signed with Marlboro Gallery, and
so that was a big deal because Marlboro Gallery was
the hottest gallery at that time. We talk about like
Basque Yacht being the first black artist to sort of
make that break. It was really my dad, like, I'm
not even gonna hold you like I'm I'm not going
to I'm not going to sugarcoat it, you know.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
But while Bosquia went on to become a household name
selling paintings for millions of dollars, Frederick J. Brown did not.
So what happened. It turns out that even after signing
with Marlborough, Brown wasn't being shown and the way he
thought he should be.
Speaker 6 (17:52):
My dad kept trying to get like a retrospective and
couldn't get a retrospective anywhere.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
So Brown took matters into his own hands when a
Taiwanese artist named C. J. Yao invited him to come
to China. It was nineteen eighty eight and communist China
was just starting to culturally open up. Only one other
American artist, Robert Rauschenberg, had shown work in the country.
But together Brown and Yao decided, let's do a Frederick J.
(18:19):
Brown retrospective in China.
Speaker 6 (18:26):
And they decided to do it in the National Museum
of China, which like is on Tienamen Square and it's
like an insanely huge building.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
The museum had been filled with relative Chairman Mao and
the Communist Revolution. But all that was cleared out to
make room for one hundred Frederick J. Brown paintings.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
And he had a lot.
Speaker 6 (18:45):
I mean, he had sixty thousand people a day for
like thirty days.
Speaker 10 (18:51):
Wow.
Speaker 6 (18:53):
He had to go to China to have a red.
He had to go to China to be seen as
an American.
Speaker 3 (18:58):
Artist because in America, Brown was seen as a black artist.
And despite what he accomplished in China, when he returned
to the States, he hadn't earned any additional prestige.
Speaker 6 (19:11):
Instead, Marlborough was pissed that he did the show because
they did it without his without their consent. He took
out a loan to do it himself of half a
million dollars. He had no way of paying it back.
So that was like the beginning of I don't want
to say the end, but it was the beginning of
like a real hardship.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
Marlborough dropped him. The bank was trying to take all
his work, which he'd put up as collateral. He was
only able to save some paintings by erasing his name
entirely so the bank would think they weren't his. Other
paintings he hid in the walls of his Worcester Street loft.
(19:55):
Brown continued to paint for the rest of his life,
but he never regained that blue trip cachet from his
early career. He didn't become a name that a non
art person like me, or even an art person like
Maya would immediately recognize. Brown died of cancer in twenty twelve,
and ten years later, Bentley's frustrated that his father still
(20:15):
doesn't have his rightful place in the cannon.
Speaker 6 (20:18):
You go up to these people that are gatekeepers and
you plead your case. Most people are just like, eh, whatever,
there's not a market for it right now, right and
it's it's like, man, fuck you.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
It's the same story for a lot of black artists. Sure,
these gatekeepers want black art, Bentley says that they want
a particular kind of black art. They want art they
can look at and go, ah, yes, I get it.
This is about the politics of being black in America.
Speaker 6 (20:48):
When we think about black art or black artists, right,
we are very quick to add like a political tag
to the thing. I mean, I guess you could argue
that blackness in and of itself is a political thing.
But my dad was kind of much more of the
camp of like just like make art for art's sake.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
But purely aesthetic work by a black art. That's what
ends up in the garbage.
Speaker 6 (21:12):
It's such a painful feeling. It's such a yeah, painful
is the word. And such a painful feeling when you
know that, like you have such a special world and
people don't give a shit.
Speaker 5 (21:27):
What is I mean?
Speaker 3 (21:28):
Like if you have to describe, like what what that
special world was?
Speaker 6 (21:33):
Like?
Speaker 1 (21:33):
What how would you explain it?
Speaker 3 (21:35):
Bentley points at the painting still leaning against the wall?
Speaker 9 (21:39):
Is that right?
Speaker 2 (21:39):
There?
Speaker 6 (21:42):
So much color, so much emotion, so much beauty. You
you two recognized it. The beanting definitely called to me. Yeah,
I mean you rescued it right like, and it's like
a piece of my dad. It's like his energy, his
spirit is him. You know. That was my dad calling
(22:03):
out to you. That's what that was.
Speaker 7 (22:06):
Like.
Speaker 6 (22:06):
Yeah, don't let me go in the trash. Yeah, my
son lives not too far away. Don't let me go
in the trash.
Speaker 3 (22:27):
Well, Bentley was able to trace the path that led
Frederick Brown's work to the metaphorical trash heap. I'm still
wondering about the literal trash heap, the one on a
Brooklyn sidewalk, And so, of course I'm still wondering about
Larry Simms. It turns out Bentley knows Lowry well. The
two are even writing a book together. When I ask
(22:48):
Bentley about Lowry's aversion to speaking with me, he alludes
to some bad experiences she's had with journalists, but he
reassures me that he'll put in a good word. And
the next morning, Bentley calls to tell me that Lowry
is willing to talk. There's just one caveat. She doesn't
want to discuss how the painting wound up in the garbage.
(23:10):
It's hard for me to figure out why. And I
don't really know how to do an interview about a
painting that ended up in the trash without asking how
the painting ended up in the trash. So I crossed
my fingers that something might shift. Once we're on the phone,
Larry takes my call from her condo in Baltimore. She
(23:31):
tells me that she met Frederick Brown when she was
around thirty, a newly minted curator at the Met. As
a curator, Lowry's mission was to champion the work of
overlooked artists. Larry herself knew what it was like to
be overlooked.
Speaker 8 (23:45):
I mean I was in, you know, as this black
girl from Queens. I had a career nobody would have
expected at that time. I was in places where nobody
expected at the time. I mean I used to tell people.
One of the most amusing things for me was to
go to a collector on Park Avenue in the seventies
(24:07):
and get to the front door and Dorman would try
to sort of scoop me around to the service entrance
because they assumed it was a housekeeper or something, you know,
and new I'm you know, sends from the Metropolitan Museum.
You want to see the face change, you know, they go, oh,
(24:28):
you know. It was a struggle to get past the
ignorance about black artists.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Like once in the seventies Larry organized because a bit
of black art from the METS collection.
Speaker 8 (24:44):
And when we got the exhibition up, I was approached
by a journalist who said, I didn't even know they
were black artists. Now this is like nineteen seventy nine.
Come on, jeez, yeah, yeah, yeah, So I say, where
we've been around since the late eighteen.
Speaker 3 (25:00):
Hundred, hearing this story, it starts to make sense why
Lowry might have been reluctant to speak with me, a
white like journalists she's never met. In fact, when I
spoke with Bentley, he said Lowry had wanted him to
suss me out, to make sure that I was okay,
before she agreed to talk to me. Like his dad,
Bentley said, Lowry too has had to be a fox.
(25:30):
Larry and Brown's friendship endured for decades, starting in that
Worcester Street loft and lasting until Brown's death, And even
after he died, Lowry continued to engage with Brown's work.
Just last summer, she helped put together a big posthumous
show of his art at the Barry Campbell Gallery in Manhattan.
Like Bentley, she wants Brown to finally get his due.
Speaker 8 (25:51):
It's a regional work, you know, it's strong work. I'm
just hopeful that, you know, Frederick gets written into the
you know, the art lexicon in the way that he
needs to be.
Speaker 3 (26:06):
When I ask Lowry why this hasn't happened yet Bentley,
she cites the aftermath of the China trip, but she
also offers this.
Speaker 8 (26:14):
He sort of left New York at a crucial period
in his career, and he put the concerns of his
family first.
Speaker 3 (26:22):
And it's true. In the nineties, Brown left New York
for a town called Carefree, Arizona. A big factor in
that decision was his daughter's asthma. Brown knew the dry
desert heat would be good for her, and although money
was still tight, the family was happy out in Arizona.
Bentley recalls his dad attending his flag football games in
his signature White Brooks Brothers suit, sweating in the Arizona
(26:46):
son and dabbing his forehead with napkins. Well, some children
of famous artists remember locked studio doors. Bentley remembers his
dad's welcoming studio couch, where he'd flopped down after school
and talk about his day while his father painted. All
of which is to say Bentley remembers Brown as a
good dad. As Lowry and I talk, I do my
(27:14):
best to avoid the whole painting and the trash thing.
So we discussed her time at the met Brown's jazz portraits,
the similarities between Genesis one and two. But then, without prompting,
Lowry volunteers this, I.
Speaker 8 (27:29):
Mean, I sort of, like, you know, kind of figured
out that I probably gazed the painting to someone who
admired it. You know, I can't remember who because it
you know, because it was certainly too big for my
low apartment.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
As it turns out, Brown had painted Lowry Genesis two
as a thank you gift because she had been the
curator who bought Genesis one for the Mets collection. But
the painting was huge, and Lowry ran into the problem
that so many New Yorkers do. Living in a cramped
apartment on the Upper east Side, she just hadn't had
space for it. For Lowry, there was no blank wall
(28:05):
above the couch, just waiting for something to be hung.
She found Genesis to a good home with a friend
who loved it.
Speaker 8 (28:13):
And I think I told Fred, you know, like about it. Yeah,
how it ended up with Amya fined it? I don't know.
I just can't remember who I might have given it to.
Speaker 3 (28:24):
I suspect that Lowry might be trying to protect a friend.
Maybe that's why she had been reluctant to talk about
the painting's loss. Maybe Larry gave the painting to someone
who moved to a smaller apartment themselves, or maybe they
died or fell on hard times and decided to sell it.
Maybe it was regifted to someone else, or sold in
a state sale, or just lost in the general shuffle
(28:46):
of life. No matter what, the end result is the same. Ultimately,
someone looked at it thought this isn't worth keeping and
threw it away. All of that, it seems, was wrapped
up and Lowry's intriguing. Does it make you sad at
all to think of art just in the trash like that?
Speaker 8 (29:06):
Well, you know, there's a saying that ninety eight percent
of all the art created in the world since the
beginning is gone.
Speaker 3 (29:18):
Do you think like the best stuff somehow makes it through?
Speaker 5 (29:21):
Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 8 (29:23):
I think it's totally random. I mean, I guess that's
why we have museums, you know, because they can be
seen as places where these things can be safe. But
I mean this book that was happening now in the Ukraine,
you know, the palming museums and cultural sites. So I
think a lot of times it's just the luck of
the draw.
Speaker 3 (29:44):
Time is the most capricious of curators. A few weeks earlier,
when Bentley came by Maya's apartment, we all sat around
and talked for hours about art and family, and finally,
when it was time to go, Maya turned to Bentley
(30:07):
and said, I don't think the painting belongs with me.
I think it belongs somewhere else. Bentley's taller than Maya
and had no problem lifting up the canvas. He thanked
Maya warmly and carried Genesis two out the door to
his car. He'd serve as the paintings caretaker until Lowry
decided what she wanted to do. Can you tell me
(30:28):
sort of like, what's happening to it now? Do you
know where it's going?
Speaker 8 (30:33):
Yeah, it's been accepted by the Studio Museum as a donation.
Speaker 4 (30:37):
Oh that's great, and the donation will be from me,
from the estate of the artists, and from Maya.
Speaker 3 (30:48):
On a warm Friday afternoon, I pay Maya visit her
Regal apartment building.
Speaker 7 (30:55):
Hello.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
She and Wes are signing the paperwork to officially donate
the painting to the Studio Museum, and I'm here to
serve as a witness. Lowry and Bentley have both already signed.
Knowing how much Maya loves the painting, I thought giving
it up would be bittersweet, but she's in high spirits.
(31:17):
She likes the idea of Genesis too hanging in a museum.
That way, thousands of people will get to enjoy it.
We'll lean towards the plaque and read the name Frederick J. Brown.
Who knows what that name might mean to people in
the future, if time will strengthen Brown's legacy or wash
it away. But for now, we finish up the paperwork
(31:38):
and all cheers a shot at tequila to celebrate, as
friends often do.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Cheers thank you.
Speaker 3 (31:49):
On my way out, I noticed that the big wall
above Maya's couch is still blank.
Speaker 9 (32:16):
Now that the fernitures returning to its goodwill home, now
that the last month's rent is scheming with the damage
with pos take this moment to des.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
If we mentain, if we.
Speaker 9 (32:38):
Talk felt around from far to.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
From things that accidentally.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
Hello Jonathan Khalila, Yeah, Hi, Hi, what's going on?
Speaker 7 (33:02):
I'm in the studio museum at the moment.
Speaker 2 (33:05):
Oh thank god. When I heard you whispering like that,
I figured immediate that you were incarcerated somehow.
Speaker 7 (33:11):
Why would I need to whisper?
Speaker 2 (33:14):
Yeah, that's true.
Speaker 7 (33:15):
It would be more likely that I'd been kidnapped and
was secretly using a phone, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (33:20):
Like from the trunk of a car. Yeah, okay, few,
I'm so glad you're in a museum instead. Why are
you in a museum.
Speaker 7 (33:27):
I'm in a museum because the studio museum is where
Frederick J. Brown's painting Genesis. To end it up, the
painting is not up at the moment, but there are
a couple galleries dedicated to like cycling things out that
are in the permanent collection. Uh huh, so I imagine it
(33:48):
will hang in one of those galleries soon.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
Ah. So you think it's in a storage room.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
I guess.
Speaker 7 (33:55):
I don't really know how museums work, but yeah, they
must have some kind of art storage. Right.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
Well, here's your chance to find out. I'm going to
put you on assignment here. Okay, do you see any
any doors that say staff only or do not enter?
Speaker 7 (34:09):
I'm standing by one right now.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
Do you want to try the doorknob?
Speaker 7 (34:12):
Let me just see.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
Is it locked?
Speaker 7 (34:16):
Yeah? It's locked.
Speaker 2 (34:18):
Well, so much for our big art heist. Well how
does it feel? I guess to know that it's it's
in its rightful place, and you had you had a
hand in that.
Speaker 7 (34:28):
That's cool, actually, I mean, even though it's not up
right now, just to be like, oh, this is its
home and it's among all this other art, and like
there's a lot of people at the museum. Oh really,
I feel like people are going to be able to
come and appreciate it. Yeah. Yeah, I was going to say,
not to presume, but are you in front of a computer?
Speaker 2 (34:46):
I am?
Speaker 10 (34:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (34:47):
Would you like to go to the Studio Museum website
and look up Frederick J. Brown in the.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
Coluction Studio Museum Frederick. There we go. Let's see. Oh
he there's three of his works here.
Speaker 7 (35:03):
Oh nice?
Speaker 2 (35:05):
And here we are, yeah, Genesis two. And you know
what what it is? Vertical?
Speaker 7 (35:15):
I know I noticed that too. I was like, maybe
we were looking at it the wrong way.
Speaker 2 (35:20):
I think we were. Yeah, And honestly, looking at it
like this, it's like looking at a whole different painting.
It does the way you see it, I know, and
you know, in a way it kind of makes more sense.
Speaker 10 (35:34):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (35:35):
Huh.
Speaker 7 (35:36):
I am so serious how they even determined that, because
I feel like when I was looking at it with Bentley,
he also thought it went horizontally.
Speaker 2 (35:44):
He did.
Speaker 7 (35:45):
Yeah, And I did speak with Bentley recently too, and
he gave me some updates about what's going on with
his father's work.
Speaker 6 (35:56):
Of the updates and the major update though, is that
we do have a retrospective of his work.
Speaker 5 (36:02):
Oh you do.
Speaker 6 (36:03):
Yeah, it's going to be opening in twenty twenty eight.
Okay at the Phoenix our museum. Great and yeah again,
I just can't thank you enough for taking on the
story like it brought us so much publicity and then
you know, we had several major exhibitions after that.
Speaker 5 (36:23):
Oh that's great. Well, thank you Bentley for talking. It's
really nice to talk to you again.
Speaker 6 (36:28):
Thanks so much.
Speaker 5 (36:29):
Talk to you later, talk to you sad.
Speaker 2 (36:41):
Thanks to everyone who helped put this episode together. If
you haven't already heard, and I can't imagine how you haven't,
We've started a free newsletter, have you, Khi La Holt
heard about our free newsletter?
Speaker 8 (36:54):
Yes?
Speaker 5 (36:54):
In fact, I've I've written stuff in it.
Speaker 2 (36:56):
Oh that's going to look great on your resume. That
sounds like a threat. Are I fired?
Speaker 1 (37:03):
Not at all?
Speaker 2 (37:04):
I'm just saying, you know, kudos to you. That's a
publication right there. So all of which to say, go
to patreon dot com slash Heavyweight to sign up, and
we'll be back once again with another exciting update in
two weeks time.
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