William Brickel at Michael Kohn Gallery

William Brickel, Two Figures Table (installation view) (2023). Oil on linen, 76 x 67.75 inches. Michael Kohn Gallery, Los Angeles, 2024. Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

Many of the near-identical subjects of William Brickel’s Was It Ever Fair. at Michael Kohn Gallery are looking down or away, as though they’ve just heard something that made them blush; their robust cheekbones are sometimes touched by a little red. Beyond this, their waxen faces are largely inscrutable. Inhabiting a dollhouse world of featureless stairwells, kitchens, and living rooms, the ashen male figures who recur across Brickel’s paintings and drawings might be either brothers or lovers. One does not get the sense that these subjects are part of a real environment. Instead, the tense, incestuous intimacy of Was It Ever Fair. closes the gap between apparent contradictions—self and other, desire and aggression—to revel in the confusion of human nature and the ambiguous feelings that compel us to one another. In Brickel’s world of doubles, the self remains stubbornly indistinct.

The doppelgangers populating Brickel’s works are often staged in moments of discord. In Two Figures Table (2023), violence and eroticism compete for the upper hand. Two lanky blonde men seem to be caught in a physical altercation: One figure sits on a table and wears a boxing glove on his left hand; he appears to have just thrown a punch, as the second man staggers in front of him. We only see the back of the boxer’s head and the dispassionate profile of his tripped-up companion, obscuring the emotional tenor of the scene. Despite the aggression inherent in the tableaux, tenderness abounds: One of the boxer’s naked feet rests cozily against his doppelganger’s socked foot, while the heel of his other is gently cradled in his companion’s outstretched hand. Brickel’s flat, 2-dimensional rendering freezes the scene, allowing its ambiguity to unfurl with plenty of time. 

Other works explore love and friendship as opportunities to be euphorically mirrored. Playing at the Fair (2023) reframes the often fraught conflation of self and other to delight in the merging of friends. One man, arms raised wildly, looks to be dancing or stumbling, while his double, who kneels behind him, holds his palms together adoringly in a prayer-like gesture. Two other figures dive out of frame, while a disembodied hand pointing at the kneeling man recalls a Manus Dei, a gesture from medieval religious painting that invokes God’s blessing. Despite the chaos, the faces of the central pair are smoothed of expressive detail; their eyes, mere gray slits, look to be carved into a mask. Out of this indeterminate affective field rises an untouchable, ecstatic tranquility not unlike the transcendent repose of Christian iconography. A moment of ridiculous fun is abruptly elevated, and the mystery that draws us to one another becomes a holy thing. Brickel’s exploration of the shifting, enigmatic self doesn’t condemn it to solitude—it illuminates obscurity as our shared condition.

William Brickel: Was It Ever Fair. runs from January 20–March 2, 2024 at Michael Kohn Gallery (1227 N. Highland Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90038)

William Brickel, Two Figures Table (detail) (2023). Oil on linen, 76 x 67.75 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

William Brickel, Was It Ever Fair. (installation view) (2024). Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

William Brickel, Was It Ever Fair. (installation view) (2024). Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

William Brickel, The Pink Room (detail) (2023). Oil on linen, 90 x 78 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

William Brickel, Was It Ever Fair. (installation view) (2024). Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

William Brickel, Holding Rifle (2023). Oil on linen, 63 x 51 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

William Brickel, Begging (Kneeling) (2023). Oil on linen, 63 x 51 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

William Brickel, Begging (Kneeling) (detail) (2023). Oil on linen, 63 x 51 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

William Brickel, Curtain Two Figures (2023). Oil on linen, 75.5 x 40.5 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

William Brickel, Playing at the Fair (detail) (2023). Oil on linen, 79 x 53.5 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

William Brickel, Was It Ever Fair. (installation view) (2024). Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

William Brickel, Was It Ever Fair. (installation view) (2024). Image courtesy of the artist and Michael Kohn Gallery.

Natasha Boyd is a writer from Los Angeles. Her work has been featured in The Nation, The Drift, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Pioneerworks, and elsewhere. You can read more of her writing at natashakboyd.com.

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