Brown, Michael (Painting)

Native North Carolinian Michael Brown chose his career as a painter when he was four years old. After an extensive art education in the US and abroad (including living in Peru, Spain, Massachusetts and New York) he became a commercial mural painter when he was thirty four. His many popular outdoor murals in Chapel Hill have made him well-known on the North Carolina art scene. Beyond being known in North Carolina he has also done large art projects in Florida, Virginia, West Virginia, New York, Chicago and Baltimore. As part of the Chapel Hill/UNC bicentennial celebration, he was commissioned to do a painting for the Franklin Street Post Office as a companion piece to an existing mural by the distinguished Depression-era artist Dean Cornwell. His large realistic historical paintings also circle the walls in the historic Orange County District Court in Hillsborough and in the rotunda of the Main Branch of the Greensboro Public Library.  He was recently featured in  articles in the News and Observer Carolina Alumni Review.Southern Living, Oxford American and others. His clients include The University of North Carolina , Duke University, IBM, the cities of Chapel Hill, Carrboro, Durham , Raleigh, Greensboro, Roxboro, Tarboro, Mebane,Henderson, and others. In the past he has served on the Chapel Hill Appearance Commission, in the creation of the Public Arts Commission of Chapel Hill, and as a juror for regional art competitions. He helped organize the the Carrboro Art Group, an artists' co-op that, among other things, created elaborate floats for North Carolina holiday season parades,and the Apple Chill Fair. He has participated in various one-person and group art shows, including a retrospective of 30 years of his smaller paintings at the Chapel Hill Museum. Early in his career he taught art in private and public schools in New York City, including a Guggenheim funded program for at-risk students,  Spence School and at Meredith College. Michael holds a BFA from UNC Chapel Hill and resided as a fellow for two years at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Mass. He was a fellow in the mural program at the National Academy of Design in New York City Throughout his 20 year long career as a muralist he has taken time to explore more personal themes and develop his skills. These paintings are a product of those more private times.