Rogan Brown's work is inspired by the tradition of scientific illustration and model making; detailed observational drawings based on patterns and motifs found in nature are transformed into incredibly detailed, delicate relief sculptures made from layer upon layer of either hand or laser cut paper. Some of the hand cut pieces take up to 5 months of painstaking work to complete, but Brown insists that this labour is an essential element in the meaning of the work. Making multiple visual references - vegetal forms, cells, microbes, fossils, insects, cloud formations, the organs and orifices of the human body - his work seeks to transform the real into the surreal creating sculptures of strange chimerical beauty.
‘I have chosen paper as a medium because it captures perfectly that mixture of delicacy and durability that for me characterizes the natural world’. He wants to communicate his fascination with the immense complexity and intricacy of natural forms, and states that his intention is to recreate that moment of awe and wonder we had as children when we looked through a microscope for the first time.
