Described by the Press and Journal as ‘Scotland’s most prominent collage artist,’ [2] Brown developed a unique style of painting influenced by Scottish, European and North American traditions.
Whilst still a student at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art, Dundee, Brown discovered the Dada ideal of ‘looking at society in fragments’.
[3] Brown's early art was influenced by Scottish figurative painters of the 1980s Steven Campbell, Joyce W Cairns, Ken Currie and German artists of the interwar period including Max Beckmann and Otto Dix.
[3] The art historian and critic Duncan Macmillan described Brown's collage technique as ‘combining cut out fragments of printed matter with paint, drawing, and scraps of writing.
The end result is like a multi-layered wall where graffiti and layers of poster and notices have been put up, torn down, and weathered over years.’[4] Brown conveys the passage of time using a wide range of traditional media, industrial paints, and recycled materials, combined with drawn and painted marks, drips and spatters.‘It’s human history, evolution, and change- that is what the work is to me.’[5] In 2019, Brown's series of fifteen paintings 'A Love Letter to Europe'[6] paid homage to specific European cities, with materials gathered from each urban environment.