The San Francisco artist Joan Brown, a self-described “eternal optimist,” survived childhood with an alcoholic father and a suicidal mother; a near-death competitive swim from San Francisco to Alcatraz; and all but her fourth marriage. Her work careened between figures swollen with paint as thick as frosting and flat, colorful still lifes with decorative elements. Brown was in the collection of MoMA by the time she was 22, but her name doesn’t conjure up a specific image because she’s impossible to classify. For Brown, painting was a diary that served to reinforce her mercurial existence. She believed in reincarnation and multiple lives, and because her art can seem the work of more than one life, it hasn’t found a proper place in art history. Now, a major retrospective at Carnegie Museum of Art goes a long way to acknowledging her abundant talent. —Patricia Zohn