The Weekly Dig 2006
Martin Mugar at New England School of
Art and Design
KATE LEDOGAR
A few summers ago, my sister and I took
a week-long class with Martin Mugar at the Fine Arts Work Center in
Provincetown. It was a sort of paint-what-you-will situation. Mostly, I was
just happy to be out at the beach, surrounded by fishermen and drag queens, and
eating lots of Portuguese pastries. I gave the painting I was working on a sort
of good-natured, half-hearted attention. OK, I dabbled. The only part of the
class that truly caught my interest was Mugar’s slide show presentation of his
own work.
At that time, he was painting dots:
vaguely patterned, and in a few repetitive colors. His slides—which spanned a
good 25 years—traced his development from exceptionally lifelike figurative
works, to a transitional period where he broke down the subtle colors forming
surfaces, to the dots-only approach he currently practices.
In my own painting experiences, there
were instances where I found myself nearly mesmerized by surfaces. Expanses of
walls and skin started breaking down into moving particles of color the more
closely I looked at them. Eventually, I felt unable to reproduce their colors
at all. In Mugar’s interim paintings—which fell stylistically between the
realism of his early work and his most abstract canvases—he was painting
surfaces as I saw them, and doing it well. His paintings gave me a mixed
feeling of awe and resentment by showing me that it was possible to do what
confounded me.
His current paintings interested me
less. I was suspicious that he had worked into abstraction in order to appear
more contemporary in style. Plus, I was probably too distracted at the time by
the promise of some local delight (perhaps a late afternoon "Doggies in
Drag" parade) to give the matter much further attention.
Now in the bleak of winter, up from the
slushy, grey streets of downtown Boston, I'm in a much more focused frame of
mind to view Mugar's paintings. Along for the trip is my sickly boyfriend, who
wanted to get out of the house.
In the small pass-through
lounge/gallery at the New England School of Art and Design, Mugar's paintings
look like sherbet-colored globs of icing on the wall—something that a little
kid would like to eat. They consist of large globs of paint in bright, chalky hues
repeated in different combinations on rectangular and square canvases. I watch
the sickly boyfriend out of the corner of my eye. From the abrupt way he stops
in front of each painting, gives it a couple of seconds, then moves onto the
next, I can tell that he's decided he's been duped. He says, "Well, when
you seen one, you seen 'em all, right?" and slips out into the hallway to
look at the student assignments pinned to the wall.
But Mugar’s paintings are meant to be
gazed at for extended periods of time; they offer a sort of mute conversation
for the eyes about the act of looking. The paint sticks out a good half-inch
from the surface; pastel smears poke out from the sides and drip off the
bottom. This texture buildup creates a topographical landscape that would
challenge an ant trying to get from one side of the painting to the other. Due
to the subtle variations of color, each painting—though similar to the ones on
either side of it—offers a unique visual experience.
After studying them closely, I no
longer think that Mugar's abstract works are contrived solely to attract
attention—in fact, just the opposite. I suspect these paintings represent an
obsessive attention to sorting out a visual "problem" that fascinates
Mugar, which he has pursued whether galleries and critics notice or not.
If you visit the show, I recommend that
you visit Mugar's website (www.martinmugar.com) beforehand—it gives some
good context and background to appreciate his work.
MARTIN MUGAR’S WORKS WILL
BE ON DISPLAY AT THE NEW ENGLAND SCHOOL OF ART & DESIGN THROUGH 2.5.06. 75
ARLINGTON ST., BOSTON. 617.573.8785. Here is a recent example of stupidity: I was accepted into a group show into a NY gallery (First St Gallery) only to be told to remove the painting ASAP after it was dropped off. I had to hire an art mover as I had already returned home to Boston.
In the first decade of the Millenium I was grateful to Charles Giuliano for including me in several group shows at the New England School of Art and Design. One show there was favorably reviewed in the Boston Globe. That kept my work in the eye of the Boston art goers after commercial galleries Crieger-Dane on Newbury St and the Rising Tide in Provincetown closed at the end of 2000. Charles had reviewed my work and I always had the impression he thought highly of it. During the second decade I was included in a series of show at the Danforth Museum. Katherine French was the director of the Museum and the shows purported to represent the New England art scene. In the nineties I had participated in similar shows at the Fitchburg Museum and the Brocton Museum to favorable reviews. French left the Danforth a few years ago and took over the art center in St Johnsbury VT where she recreated the same sort of group show bringing in New England based critics to select the work. Covid 19 has brought an end to this annual event. My last encounter with French was before the last show when I dropped off work in Boston to be shipped by her to Vermont. I was still smarting from the unceremonious treatment at the First St gallery and was hoping that she might promote a piece that represented my work at its best.Yes it was heavy. I sensed her unwillingness to take it and when I explained the rejection of my work by the New York gallery that had been selected by Ronnie Landfield after I had dropped it off she started in a long litany of complaints of having to hang my work over the years. I dawned on me she had never complimented me on my work. It was just a heavy burden. So much for respecting my 50 years of showing and contributing to the art scene in Boston.
