The settings for some of Delia Brown's paintings are taken from rooms pictured in home décor magazines like Veranda, "decadent, what I think of as nouveau riche rooms" in which she portrays herself and others--some of them friends--"drinking and hanging out."

Her model for these works is 19th-century genre paintings, in which political and social issues were raised, and "I try to make my paintings beautiful," Delia says. At the same time, she understands that the contemporary art scene may not be receptive to her work.

"If there's anything political or social going on in a work, it's declared didactic," Delia says, "and in recent years, people have become very sensitive about the overt politics in work. I try to walk a fine line between providing a pleasurable experience for viewers, and giving them something to think about." Moreover, she believes that academia fosters "this suspicion that there can't be any content below anything that's good-looking." This antipathy to glamour extends beyond the world of art to a "suspicion of a woman who appears anything other than intellectual."

A conversation with Delia Brown crackles with the tension of opposing forces. For example, she says, "My paintings are so much about living a fantasy life-not necessarily one you actually aspire to because it's out of line with your ethics-but one that's alluring on other levels."

Another example: Although Delia works with brushes and oils or sometimes watercolors, "I don't call myself a painter," she says. "The preoccupations of painters aren't in the forefront of my mind. The formal issues serve content rather than existing as the primary concern."

In a recent work for studio review by the Art Department's faculty and peers, Delia used her paintings to create a setting for a performance work dealing again with issues of artifice. With her paintings as a backdrop, Delia set up a "salon," both in the 19th-century sense of an intellectual or cultural gathering and in the 20th-century sense of "a place to get primped." "Basically, I gave people make-overs," she says, 10 a day for the two days of the show. "I couldn't keep up with the demand," mostly from students and mostly women.

Although her make-overs were straightforward "I didn't want to make them artsy. I wanted them to feel great about how they looked," her motivations went beyond those of the typical makeup artist. "By painting someone's face, giving them a different face, I thought I might also affect their social interactions" as they continued to tour the studio show. Indeed, she believes that many of the women, unused to wearing makeup, felt self-conscious. In an academic setting, she says, "it's such a challenge to be taken seriously as an intellectual if your looks are distracting." Thus, the accepted appearance at UCLA is at odds with the "glamour quotient" that's identified with Los Angeles, she says.

Raised in Los Angeles, Delia grew up hoping to work in the arts, and a few years ago, she settled on the visual arts. She applied for the MFA program at UCLA because "I was working in isolation and looking for a community of artists, a more intense art environment, to see what impact it would have on my work." That impact was strong: Until this year, she didn't show any of her work off campus, because it was changing so rapidly. Now in her final year, Delia is preparing for her thesis presentation in March, another salon-style performance "making viewers more aware of social positioning.

She will apply for teaching jobs but is "trying not to worry about" the future. This raises another set of tensions about the relationship between academia and art.

"Most of the world seems to think that it's really strange to get an advanced degree in art because how can anyone teach you to make art? Even artists come to art school thinking that," she says. After her experience as a teaching assistant with undergraduate art students, she concluded that "if they're not willing to take art school seriously, to realize that art is a discipline, then chances are, they're going to find something easier to do." On the other hand, she acknowledges that she can't teach anyone to make "good art." As a student, she feels faculty are here "to help un-confuse you," rather than to provide any formal pedagogical structure.

Delia sees the need to combine the "romantic ideal" of an "inspired artist" with a critical consciousness about audience. Her goal is to convey complex content in her work, while still keeping it accessible and alluring.

Published in Winter 2000, Graduate Quarterly