PAINT RELIEVER
After a paralyzing accident and a bad breakup, this Brooklyn man finds solace in creating art
W HEN his legs stopped moving, he started painting. When his heart broke, he turned that into art, too. Setbacks seem to have that effect on Brandon (B.D.) White. Fifteen years after a high-school pole-vaulting accident left him paralyzed — and nine months after a long-term relationship ended — the 33-year-old Brooklyn street artist is getting his first major solo gallery show.
It’s a big departure from his usual turf: the lampposts and walls where, armed with stencils and spray paint, he rose to Instagram fame by practicing what he calls “mindful vandalism” (not to be confused with graffiti).
“I call it ‘mindful’ because I think a lot about what I do, and I take time to make it,” White says.
The Williamsburg loft that serves as his home and studio was a beehive of activity on a recent Wednesday as his mother and sister pitched in with final preparations for his show, at a gallery on the Lower East Side.
“Brandon’s always been someone with a quiet drive,” Shannon White tells The Post of her third child (of six), who’s always been drawn to art. “He does not give up.”
What White did give up was college: After the leap that broke his back at 18, he threw himself into a grueling, six-year physical rehabilitation program in Utah.
Bored in his off-hours, White started painting. To give his images greater depth, he began using stencils, the designs getting more and more intricate with time.
A $6 million settlement in 2009 helped him buy his Williamsburg live-work loft, as well as a handcontrolled car. What insurance money couldn’t buy, White says, was a show: “Galleries don’t want to show your work until they know you’re a saleable artist, because they’ve got rent to pay. I was a nobody.”
Seven years ago, inspired by a documentary about outlaw artist Banksy, White took his art to the streets. Leaving his apartment around midnight, he’d stencil his way around Williamsburg until 3 a.m., as friends kept a lookout for police. White says he’s been stopped by cops four times but never arrested. “I think the wheelchair had a part in that,” he says.
Instagram gave him the professional boost he needed. His detailed, often pointed images of flying doves, beautiful women and Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, all hashtagged “Williamsburg,” received lots of love. After gallery owner Vincent Harrison saw one of White’s posts, he visited his studio and offered him a show.
“Love, Loss, and Longing” opened last week at Harrison’s Castle Fitzjohns Gallery. The show’s central image is an astronaut: Floating in space, he’s a metaphor for “isolation, loneliness, heartbreak,” says White, who started painting astronauts after his longtime girlfriend left him on New Year’s Day. It’s her face you’ll see on several canvases.
White hasn’t returned to dating yet. He’s too busy making — and selling — his pieces. Harrison says half of White’s works sold before the show opened last Thursday.
He says he’s considering a break from street-stenciling, too.
“I’d like something legal to do, and to make something bigger and better,” White says. “I want to break barriers.”