Mario M. Muller:
Heaven or Las Vegas
DCKT Contemporary, New York
May 7 - June 18, 2005
DCKT Contemporary presents MARIO M. MULLER’s second New York solo exhibition. The show consists of India ink drawings from "The Las Vegas Suite (2004-5)", ranging in scale from 48x68 inches to 26x40 inches. This exhibition marks the debut of Mario M. Muller’s Las Vegas Suite which was begun in 2004 and which the artist sees as an on-going series.
Drawn to the high and incredibly bright desert light of Las Vegas, Mario M. Muller offers a view of this tourist and gambling destination that transcends the fleeting glances a typical stroll down the strip might afford a casual viewer. Mario M. Muller’s visual paradigm has been to transform the instantly recognizable aspects of an urban existence and offer them anew, stripped of detail and feature. For this new body of work, the artist has departed from the human form and focused on the architectural details of a city where veneer replaces substance. Each work is a still life in high-contrast silhouette and shadow depicting building facades, marquees, artificial parking lot lights, and surveillance technology.
The largest scale drawing in the exhibition, LV #10, is of an ornamental cupola of iron filigree and rows of light bulbs as seen from a severe vertical angle, silhouetted against the stark desert sky. The immense amount of vertiginous detail acts abstractly when viewed from near and, as one recedes, snaps into focus.
The entire oeuvre creates a visual pendulum swing between the immediately identifiable landscape and an abstracted and narrow view of light and shadow patterns on three-dimensional objects. Throughout, Muller harnesses the high contrast and liquid nature of India ink to mimic the pooling and fluid aspects of sunlight. The strong horizontal proportions of these compositions are reminiscent of the panoramic vistas of the West.
Mario M. Muller’s work is included in the permanent collections of The Speed Art Museum, Louisville, KY; University of Louisville, KY; Northwestern University, Evanston, IL. Mario M. Muller was recently commissioned by the MTA Network Poster Program to interpret the New York City subway system and was named an Art in Transit commission finalist for the Kingsbridge Road Station in the Bronx.
DCKT CONTEMPORARY
552 West 24th Street, New York, NY
www.dcktcontemporary.com
