Art, as both an imitation of life or feeling, and as a creation, has always toed the line between what is truth and what is only artifice. Perhaps now more so than ever, as we confront the growing popularity of AI-generated artworks, some near-indistinguishable from photography – ‘real-life’ images, if such a term can exist without contradicting itself. And, it seems, artifice need not be confined only to the creation. The creator, too, can lie.
The Connor Brothers emerged in 2012 onto the London art scene, parading as American twins who had escaped a pseudo-Christian cult called ‘The Family.’ A striking backstory indeed, but thoroughly false. Franklin and Brendan Connor were in fact not American, not twins, and most certainly not cult-escapees. Mike Snelle and James Golding confessed later that year that they’d fabricated their interesting beginnings to cover up what they considered the more shameful reality. Golding was an ex-heroin addict, and Snelle was less than a year shy of having been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Following this revelation they continued to show their art as themselves, and their next Sydney show ‘All This Happened, More or Less’ borrowed the opening line of Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five in defense of the now-unearthed hoax, “What is truth and what is fiction, and what’s it matter anyway, so long as you understand the message?”
Snelle credits his diagnosis as the origin of the ruse. In 2012 he experienced a mental breakdown, received an emergency referral to a psychiatrist, and received the unfortunate prognosis. He gave up his gallery, the Black Rat in Shoreditch, and moved into the studio of fellow art dealer and former addict James Golding, whom he had met at Cambridge university, studying philosophy.
The two began producing work together, which Golding was keen to show, but Snelle, desperate to keep the lowest profile possible until he felt he had recovered, refused. To prevent an indeterminate wait, the Connor brothers were born. A lie begotten not of mischief, but of shame.
Though the grand reveal did nothing to dent their popularity, Golding and Snelle have admitted that they miss the masquerade, if only because it gave them access to unvarnished critiques of their work. “In public, people aren’t very truthful with artists. They tend to just tell them that they’re brilliant,” Golding said, “Whereas when we were hiding behind this fictional story and being the artists’ ‘representatives’, you could listen to people just being completely honest and that was amazing, because often it was quite vitriolic: they would hate it or they would love it.”
The pair use their art to tackle the issues of the day, from social media and politics to fake news and the pursuit of pleasure. Much of their work refashions Penguin book covers and cheap 1950s paperbacks with new, conversation-distilling slogans. Some lean satirical, like their piece “A Load of Fuss About Fuck All,” which plays on Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, or “Like the Fire Needs Air I Won’t Burn Unless You’re There”, which borrows a quote from 50 Cent’s 2005 song Hustler’s Ambition. Others are more directly political – their more recent Pride in Prejudice harkens to Austen’s classic while attributing authorship to Donald Trump, or The Secret Garden Party, which the brothers have ascribed to Boris Johnson.
Perhaps the Brothers’ best known works are their pin-up pieces, which juxtaposes classic portraits of vintage beauties against witty or surprising captions, such as “I drink, therefore I can”, or ‘I sometimes think that God, in creating men, somewhat overestimated his ability’.
Their most recent collection, the Regression series, is a notable departure from the work they are famed for. This collection emerges from art therapy sessions undertaken by the duo during lockdown, and features deliberately childlike drawings of skeletons, dinosaurs, or purposefully naive undertakings of various recognisable artworks, inspired by 60-second sketch assignments set during art therapy sessions. The collection remains true to the pithy textuality of their earlier works, however, pairing sketchy Tyrannosaurs with a la mode titles like ‘Cancel Culture,’ ‘Main Character Energy,’ and ‘Heroin.’
Outside of their shows, the Brothers’ have embarked on a number of altruistic endeavours, teaming up with Russian activist group Pussy Riot to address Europe’s refugee crisis via theatrical performance at Banksy’s Dismaland in 2015, as well as with Professor Green and the mental health charity CALM, to raise awareness around men’s mental health.
