ABOUT THE ARTIST

Michael’s passionate art often belies the quiet sensitivity of an artist who has worked successfully with severely handicapped children, instructed inmates at a federal penitentiary and was an artist-in-residence in an elementary school. Michael has participated in numerous exhibitions both in the United States and Europe, received numerous awards, and his work resides in the permanent collections of several galleries and numerous private collections.

Michael knew when decided to become an artist. When he was 13 years old his family moved back to Indiana and in his first day as an 8th grade student he walked through the front doors of Woodrow Wilson Middle School and was stunned by two massive Gilbert Brown murals (who studied with Diego Rivera) flanking a flight of limestone steps. In Michael’s words: “I didn’t really understand what I was seeing, but I knew at that moment that someday I wanted to be an artist.”

“If they give you ruled paper, write the other way.”

― Juan Ramón Jiménez as quoted in the epigraph in Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

Michael Bruners drawings are highly-detailed scenes described in pencil and graphite that sometimes take surrealist inspiration. Michael is influenced by images that surround him today, pulled from memories of his past, or from the dreams and  visions of the future. 

His drawings evoke a momentary recognition in the viewer and a sense of familiarity, but with a confusion of pushed reality, and a combination and exchange of the real and unreal. His work sometimes take as subjects repressed thoughts and their metaphors, and attempts to consider the complexities of identity, subliminal emotions and thoughts. Michael’s art infuses beauty, humor and repulsion to create art that is sometimes delivered with a blow, sometimes with a caress. 

Bruner’s work always marks a period of his life and he attempts to show the line of his march in his art. He is relentless in following the pull of his inspiration, regardless of where it leads.

“I have always approached my art in that I don’t owe anything to anyone in this one part of my life. I do what I want, how I want to do it. If others view it favorably - outstanding.”

― Michael Bruner

Bruner received BFA in Design and an MFA in Painting from Indiana State University, and through the following years worked in art and design fields as an artist, graphic designer, illustrator, book designer and website designer and developer.

Michael Bruner is currently living and working in rural Illinois, United States.