APARTMENTS: medium prints

A move to Shanghai inspired a shift in subjects for my prints from common scenes in the forest to common scenes in the city. My Apartments series captures views of the ubiquitous six story walk up apartments that most of the middle class has occupied for the last few decades. In a city rapidly filling up with a forest of modern skyscrapers, these historic low-rise apartments provide rich texture around daily life absent from modern apartments.

These micro landscapes blend the diverse architecture of Shanghai’s recent past with the functionality of modern life. Shanghai is famous for the poles, filled with hung laundry, that jut out from apartment windows. In festival seasons, it is common to see fish and meat drying next to clothes.

People transform their individual units to serve their personal needs and expand their spaces. This is especially true for the older buildings, thus making once generic facades alive with the texture of diverse window designs, porch configurations, a/c unit add-ons, laundry drying apparatus, window security gates and urban gardens. The hanging laundry, a stand in for the people living inside.

Together, these additions create complex layers of visual textures that elevate the blandness of the architecture and reveals the vibrancy of the occupants.

Apartment 22, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.

Apartment 22
linoleum block print
22" x 30" (56cm x 76cm)
edition of 15
©2016 All rights reserved.

Apartment 21, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.

Apartment 21
linoleum block print
22" x 30" (56cm x 76cm)
edition of 15
©2016 All rights reserved.

Apartment 20, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.

Apartment 20
linoleum block print
22" x 30" (56cm x 76cm)
edition of 15
©2016 All rights reserved.

Apartment 29, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.

Apartment 19
linoleum block print
22" x 30" (56cm x 76cm)
edition of 15
©2016 All rights reserved.

Apartment 18, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.

Apartment 18
linoleum block print
22" x 30" (56cm x 76cm)
edition of 15
©2016 All rights reserved.

Apartment 17, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.

Apartment 17
linoleum block print
22" x 30" (56cm x 76cm)
edition of 15
©2016 All rights reserved.

Apartment 16, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.

Apartment 16
linoleum block print
22" x 30" (56cm x 76cm)
edition of 15
©2016 All rights reserved.

Apartment 15, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.

Apartment 14, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.

Apartment 12, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.

Apartment 11, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.

Apartment 9, a black and white linoleum block
print of an apartment building in Shanghai by artist Nicholas Brown.