Brush Restaurant To Paint New Art Scene On Phuket
- Brush will be an artistic centre on Phuket
John Underwood, an understated, almost 60 Australian, has a vision for Phuket’s art scene: create a centre of excellence where artists of every hue can gather and display their works.
That place is Brush, Underwood’s new restaurant on Kalim Beach with fantastic sunset views, a eclectic tapas menu from an award winning chef and with the potential to become the focal point for the Phuket artist community.
Sculpture, painting and other forms of conventicle art are on the “menu” at Brush. But Underwood also has other, more creative ideas.
“Why not do an exhibition of those crazy mudflaps on Thai trucks with pictures of movies stars, such as Silvester Stallone? Or why not tattoos? They are now universally accepted all over the world by everyone. Why not an exhibition of the best tattoos on Phuket?”
Such creativity is expected from John Underwood by those who know him. After 19 years on Phuket he has developed a reputation for producing works of art out of every conceivable type of material, much of it recycled, at his Underwood factory on Phuket’s by-pass road.
He has worked with most of the large hotels on Phuket, including doing the design for Indigo Pearl, a northern island resort noted for its unusual look and feel.
Brush is his latest project, very much aimed at bringing the island’s highly varied artist community to the public–and together.
The restaurant will stage exhibitions, fashion shows, kinetic art [moving art] shows. In fact, anything that has an artistic bent to it, Underwood is willing to give it a go.
A model might be Bangkok’s now famous Bed Restaurant, where patrons lie back on comfortable “beds” to eat food while watching artists at work.
Patrons at Brush won’t be lying down, but the restaurant is laid out in such a way that a fashion show, or a sculpture beavering away while other eat and drink, could carry on in front of appreciative eyes.
