You would think that if the heater is heating to the point that you have to take off all your clothes, you would just turn it off and get dressed, but what do we know?

Joan Brown was an artist of interior life. She loved to incorporate the space around her into her works and this piece is no exception. Although it’s odd for Brown to have painted a model. Usually the only models in her life were her son Noel, her four (you go, girl) husbands, and her many, many pets. But nonetheless here is a model in all of her naked, overheated glory. Well, not completely naked…She’s rocking some sick little slippers.

This woman has that 90 degree summer in LA look about her, which is to say she looks miserable. It’s honestly not a flattering portrait. She’s kind of a mess. Her hair is all pouffy, and her nipples seem to be literally trying to jump off her boobs (which might be another clue that she is cold not hot, but that’s beside the point). Altogether she seems to be suffering from what the French have so classically deemed ennui. Maybe it’s her love life, maybe she’s thinking about that boy that she had a connection with in the seventh grade and where he is now, maybe she has daddy issues, mommy issues or both, or maybe it’s just a resting existential crisis face. Whatever the case may be, she ain’t happy about it.