Welcome to My Art
Contemporary Figurative Painting
I am a figurative abstract impressionist painter, and my work explores queer identity through a deeply personal lens. Using oil on canvas, I reflect on moments of resilience, vulnerability, and the evolving sense of self.
My recent body of work is shaped by my experiences of growing up during the late 1970s and 1980s, when living as a gay man often meant navigating a double life. I respond to the societal and political pressures of that era—forces that sought to suppress queer lives through targeted shame and rigid ideals of family and masculinity.
Now, later in life, I find myself discarding the shame I once carried for simply being who I am. Painting has become a way to examine that internalised shame, and to let it go. It’s an act of reclamation—of self, of story, and of space, promoting queer visibility.
Exhibitions
29 Aug - 7 Sept 2025, Glasgow School of Art, Postgraduate Degree Show 2025, GSA, Stow Building, Glasgow, G4 9LD. Exhibition information. Come along and see my latest body of work on display. It will be great to see you all there.
25 Sept - 1 Oct 2025, The Makar's Mark with the AC Collective, Alchemy Experiment, 157 Byres Road, Glasgow, G12 8TS. Exhibition information.
Past Exhibition 2025
12 Aug - 26 Aug, Starter Pack - Graduates Show Case, Six Foot Gallery. Exhibition information.
17 Jul - 8 Aug, 'SOMETHING IN THE MIRAGE', Six Foot Gallery, group summer exhibition. Exhibition information.
My Body of Work
Figurative Narratives of Queer Reflection
Alan Brash’s paintings offer a tender and powerful exploration of queer identity, memory, and emotional resilience. Through oil on canvas, Brash presents a series of intimate figurative works that move between solitude and connection, drawing from personal experiences of growing up gay and the evolving complexities of selfhood.
His subjects—often self-portraits or anonymous male figures—occupy sparse domestic interiors or abstracted outdoor settings. They are presented in quiet moments: resting, gazing, absorbed in thought, or in the comforting embrace of a lover. These figures are neither idealised nor dramatised; instead, they feel real, human, and emotionally grounded.
Bold fields of colour—intense blues, hot ochres, and deep reds—frame and isolate the figures, generating a sense of psychological space. The visual language is both direct and symbolic, with colour and posture conveying inner states that words might resist. There is a cinematic stillness to these compositions, drawing the viewer into moments of vulnerability, intimacy, and subtle defiance.
As an older artist reflecting on a life shaped by concealment, resilience, and eventual liberation, Brash brings a renewed clarity and sensitivity to themes of shame, visibility, and queer domesticity. His work invites us to pause and witness—to see the quiet strength in bare bodies, soft gestures, and the spaces we call home.