Adrien Brody’s Latest Art Monstrosity Is a Mural for Raising Cane’s

Raising Cane’s is a place where you can buy chicken finger combos, super-sized Cokes, and crinkle-cut fries, all for under $15—a steal in today’s economy. Now, it’s also a place where you can … see art?

Such is the case, at least, at the fast food chain’s Times Square establishment, where a new mural featuring the eatery’s logo was unveiled this week. Its maker is none other than Adrien Brody.

Though better known as an Oscar-winning actor, Brody has recently gained attention as a painter, exhibiting artworks that riff on work by artists such as Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and more. These pieces have occasionally sold for top dollar—one painting went for $425,000 at a gala in Cannes last year—but they have been met with a less warm reception from the press.

Last year, when Brody had a New York exhibition, for example, this critic noted that his art fails to meaningfully respond to Pop art. “Warhol’s Monroe paintings are gorgeous—one at the Museum of Modern Art, a few blocks away from Brody’s Eden show, features her portrait set amid a field of gold,” I wrote of that exhibition. “On the other hand, Brody’s Monroe paintings are rather ugly: Their surfaces are all torn up, as though someone had clawed away at the canvas. Where Warhol’s Monroes feel lush, Brody’s look cheap and defiled.”

His Raising Cane’s work, titled Cane’s Anthem, continues the Pop-lite aesthetic, utilizing phrases and images that appear to be culled from the mass media. There’s a giant American flag; the words “WINNER WINNER CHICKEN DINNER!,” printed in a font that recalls advertising; a big Raising Cane’s logo; and Labradors wearing bandanas emblazoned with the enterprise’s icon. There are also pieces of the Playbill for The Fear of 13, a play that starred Brody earlier this year, marking his Broadway debut.

All of these elements are made to look ripped and weathered, as though they were plastered to the wall of a building on a city street. That tactic may situate this work within a lineage that includes Jacques Villeglé and Mimmo Rotella, artists who used swiped, torn ads during the postwar era. But Cane’s Anthem comes off as a budget version of those artists’ work.

According to Brody, Cane’s Anthem is a tribute to Raising Cane’s founder Todd Graves, whom Brody called a friend in a statement. Brody claimed the work “echoes the grit, perseverance, and entrepreneurial spirit that defines Graves’s journey, the spirit of NYC and an urban aesthetic that has always spoken to me growing up here.”

“At its center,” Brody continued, “the iconic Raising Cane’s Global Flagship in Times Square emerges as a beacon of ambition and community, illuminated amidst the visual energy of the city. Through its richly textured surface, Cane’s Anthem celebrates not only determination and triumph, but also Todd’s enduring generosity, philanthropy, and belief in bringing people together.”

In a telease, Raising Cane’s characterized Brody’s work a “masterpiece,” which is debatable. But on the topic of bringing people together, please enjoy this picture of Brody sharing a soda with Graves beneath a large sign reading “FINGERS.”