Obvious Oblivious brings together new paintings & works on paper by Becky Brown. The title is drawn from Brown’s interest in pairs of words that are formally similar but ambiguously related in their content: Obvious/Oblivious, Intimate/Infinite, Data/Dust. The words become elements in pictorial compositions––abstract or representational––revealing connections that extend unexpectedly from form to content, by etymology or chance. Other works offer visual interpretations of Haiku by poet Jen Currin, part of Brown’s long-standing series adapting pre-modern poetic forms to the 2D picture plane. Systems of rhythm and repetition become Concrete poetry, mixing up conventions of reading and looking. Text-based works are hung alongside works without text, reversing the perceptual/cognitive divide: text must be seen while it is read and images must be read while they are seen.