The Connor Brothers at Maddox Gallery, November 2023

The Connor Brothers’ Ride or Die collection opens at Maddox Gallery on 26 November as five limited edition prints that pair figuration with hand-drawn text, examining loyalty, freedom and the stories we construct around desire. The brothers, who have built their reputation across galleries and institutions globally, bring their signature wit to prints rendered in controlled colour: vivid reds and oranges in one work, cool greys and blues in another, saturated grounds that anchor rather than distract.

Jordana and Casper Feeney, known professionally as the Connor Brothers, work across painting, print and installation, their visual language built from the familiar forms of commercial art: the pulp paperback cover, the period photograph, the children’s book illustration. Their practice rests on a simple principle: subvert these recognisable forms with dark humour or tenderness, and you create tension between the pleasure of recognition and the discomfort of being seen. In the Ride or Die series, a figure on horseback rendered in classical adventure serial style carries the work’s title; elsewhere, a great white shark in cool greys sits beneath the text When I’m Hungry I Eat; two figures in period dress stand against saturated blue beneath Freedom Ain’t Free.

What distinguishes the brothers’ approach is the refusal to settle into sentiment or easy provocation. The text appears not as caption but as conversation, as if image and word are arguing with one another or agreeing in ways that make no logical sense but perfect emotional sense. The hand-drawn letterforms sit integral to the composition rather than floating above it, which means reading becomes physical: your eye must travel the path the artist’s hand took, following the contours of letter and line.

The five prints form a cohesive statement about how we narrate our own stories and the fictions we choose to believe in order to make sense of desire and connection. The brothers have developed their visual vocabulary over years of work across museums and galleries, and the confidence shows in the mark making and in their understanding of how image and text function together. This is not decoration; it is conversation on paper.

The palette throughout the collection operates with restraint. Vivid reds and oranges in one print, cool greys and blues in another, saturated backgrounds that anchor rather than distract from the figures. The hand drawn text sits integral to the image rather than floating above it, which means the reading of the work becomes physical: your eye must travel the same path the artist’s hand took, following the contours of letter and line.

What makes the work function is the refusal to settle into sentiment. The Connor Brothers understand their audience well enough to trust that sincerity can coexist with irony, that a work can be both visually accomplished and emotionally honest. The prints arrive as distinct pieces yet form a cohesive statement about how we narrate our own stories and the fictions we choose to believe in order to make sense of desire and connection.

Collectors of contemporary work will find in these prints a rare combination: technical skill in figuration and colour, conceptual rigour, and genuine warmth beneath the irony. The brothers have spent years developing their visual vocabulary, and it shows in the confidence of their mark making and their understanding of how image and text can work together. This is not decoration; it is conversation on paper.

The work does not require you to choose between thinking and feeling, which is precisely why it lands so cleanly. You can admire the formal qualities of the composition and simultaneously feel the emotional truth of what the text is saying. That dual register is harder to achieve than it appears, and the Connor Brothers execute it with the ease of artists who have thought deeply about what they are trying to say and why it matters.

The five limited edition prints from the Ride or Die collection will be available through Maddox Gallery from 26 November. Registration for notification of availability is open through the gallery’s website, and collectors should register early given the limited nature of the edition and the growing interest in the brothers’ work across galleries and institutions globally.

Each print carries the distinctive visual language that has made the Connor Brothers’ work recognisable across museums, galleries and private collections: the bold figuration, the colour control, the text that functions as image. The Ride or Die series represents a natural evolution of their practice while introducing new territory in how they are thinking about freedom, commitment and the stories we tell ourselves about who we are and who we want to be.

Imagery courtesy of Maddox Gallery (@maddoxgallery).