Brad Pitt is making his debut as a sculptor, showing several pieces in a new exhibit at the Sara Hildén Art Museum in Tampere, Finland.
The exhibition, We, will be on display until Jan. 15, 2023. We primarily features sculptures and paintings from the British artist Thomas Houseago, but it also includes nine sculptures from Pitt as well as a series of ceramic pieces from the musician Nick Cave.
Like Pitt, this is the first time Cave has exhibited his artwork publicly. The Sara Hildén museum website notes that both Pitt and Cave created the pieces featured in We “during the course of an ongoing dialogue with Houseago.”
Pitt’s contribution to We includes two large pieces: a giant plaster panel depicting a gunfight (dubbed “Aiming At You I Saw Me But It Was Too Late This Time”) and a bronze coffin-like box peppered with limbs that look like they’re breaking through the material. There are also smaller works, like a small house made out of bark and held together with tape, as well as another house made of silicon shot through with bullets.
Per The Art Newspaper, Pitt spoke about his work at the exhibition opening, saying, “For me, it’s about self-reflection… It was born out of ownership over what I call a ‘radical inventory of the self.’ And getting really brutally honest with me and taking account of those I may have hurt, and the moments I’ve just gotten wrong.”
Pitt has long been interested in making art, telling Rolling Stone in 2008, “I have this fantasy of my older days, painting or sculpting or making things.” But the actor really took up sculpting following his divorce from Angelina Jolie in 2016. In a 2017 GQ profile, he noted he’d essentially shacked up at Houseago’s studio to work on his craft, saying, “I find it a great opportunity for the introspection. Now you have to be real careful not to go too far that way and get cut off in that way. I’m really good at cutting myself off, and it’s been a problem. I need to be more accessible, especially to the ones I love.”
Pitt’s artistic debut follows the arrival of his latest film, Bullet Train, and ahead of the release of his next project, Babylon. Pitt and Jolie are also still disputing the custody arrangement for their six children. Earlier this summer, Rolling Stone obtained FBI records that shed additional light on why Pitt wasn’t charged in the alleged jet assault that pre-empted his divorce from Jolie.