John Miller (b. 1954) is an American artist, writer and musician whose painting, photography, sculpture and installations critique systems of value embedded in American culture. He earned his M.F.A. from the California Institute of the Arts in 1979, where he studied amid the emergence of conceptual and post-studio practices. Miller became widely known for his “brown works” of the 1980s and 1990s, coating paintings, reliefs and everyday objects in a thick, fecal-looking material. By applying the same deliberately repellent surface to consumer goods and art objects, Miller collapsed distinctions between commodity and waste, while parodying the expressive brushwork traditionally associated with high art. His work examines how capitalism, taste and cultural institutions determine what objects—and whose labor—are assigned value. Associated with post-Conceptual and abject art, Miller has remained an influential cultural critic whose practice combines humor, discomfort and institutional critique. His work has been exhibited internationally and is held in collections including the Whitney Museum of American Art and Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles.