Ron Mueck

[Paper Hearts]

http://news.scotsman.com/scotland.cfm?id=1419862006

Mueck, Ron (1958- ) Ron Mueck is a London-based photo-realist artist. Born in Melbourne, Australia, to parents who were toy makers, he labored on children’s television shows for 15 years before working in special effects for such films as “Labyrinth,” a 1986 fantasy epic starring David Bowie.

Muek then started his own company in London, making models to be photographed for advertisements. He has lots of the dolls he made during his advertising years stored in his home. Although some still have, he feels, “a presence on their own,” many were made just to be photographed from a particular angle—”one strip of a face,” for example, with a lot of loose material lurking an inch outside the camera’s frame.

Eventually Mueck concluded that photography pretty much destroys the physical “presence” of the original object, and so he turned to fine art and sculpture. In the early 1990s, still in his advertising days, Mueck was commissioned to make something highly realistic, and was wondering what material would do the trick. Latex was the usual, but he wanted something harder, more precise. Luckily, he saw a little architectural decor on the wall of a boutique and inquired as to the nice, pink stuff’s nature. Fiberglass resin was the answer, and Mueck has made it his bronze and marble ever since.

In the three years since his participation in Sensation: Works from the Saatchi Collection, Mueck has posted shows at major galleries in New York, Germany, not to mention selection for the London Millenium Dome and now his work is the subject of a solo exhibition at that city’s highest profile contemporary art space, Anthony d’Offay gallery.

[mallochai]

His stuff is brilliantly creepy. Like the blood on the baby's head.... grrrrrross. But beautiful.

*squinches her nose*

Eeehhh... I like the one of the two people lying in bed the best. Although the two little old ladies are really fun.

[kellygrrrrrl]

Wow.....those are outstanding!

Unbelievable.

[BrassFusion]

Creepy.

[Paper Hearts]

I find it really difficult to look at these sculptures without wondering what they're thinking or what they're saying. It's like I stare at them looking for some clue in their expresions or positions...except for the selfportrait head...and I stare at that one wondering if it's dreaming, because it looks like it is. It's just beautiful how one of the babys eyes is opened and you realize that it's looking at the world for the first time and it's just wondering about things...and the other baby you can almost hear crying, it just seems like such a taxing experience to view that last baby sculpture. And all of his works have a certain meloncholy about them which makes you sort of try to put the entire world in perspective...the woman's face in the sculpture where she's lying in bed is at least as interesting as the famous Mona Lisa's, to me. I would so love to go to a Ron Mueck show. Hopefully one will hit Chicago soon.

[Onyx]

wow.

The detail is incredible.

[Paper Hearts]

^It is amazing. I've had the opportunity to see a show of paintings by Gerhard Richter, who also sometimes uses "photo realism" and that was such a great show. I've seen a couple of Mueck's sculptures, in London, but never an entire exhibition.

Here are some Richter paintings:

And a favorite of mine, Chuck Close's selfportrait (acrylic on canvas):

[BrassFusion]

Wow!!!! Damn, that's the sort of shit I would want to hang in my atrium. If I had one. I'm really in love with that first one, though, the blurry blued-out lady.

[Paper Hearts]

^That is a painting of the (last) late Shaw of Iran's wife. It's part of a series of women decending staircases, after Marcel Duchamp's famous 'Nude Decending Staircase'.

[BrassFusion]

O_o She looks kind of glamorous for a muslim...

[kellygrrrrrl]

I am in love with Ron Muecks art!

Beautiful....all of them.

I don't think it is creepy at all....

I think they are fascinating.

The paintings are nice.....

not really eye catching to me personally....but still very nice....

I thought that bottom painting was a photo actually.

[Paper Hearts]

I am in love with Ron Muecks art!

Beautiful....all of them.

I don't think it is creepy at all....

I think they are fascinating.

The paintings are nice.....

not really eye catching to me personally....but still very nice....

I thought that bottom painting was a photo actually.

I agree, Mueck is great. I can only imagine how amazing one of his shows must be, after spending two days at Gerhard Richter's exhibition...I would need like a week for Mueck. But you really should see the brush strokes used in those paintings. The strokes in Richter's typically all go in one direction, such as a 45 degree angle, or are cross hatched. And you only really see the brush strokes because he's wanted to make a point of them.

[kellygrrrrrl]

It's the subjects themselves that are most inspiring to me...

such ordinary people.

The baby on moms belly to me is most precious.

I really enjoyed these thanks for posting PH!

[Paper Hearts]

It's the subjects themselves that are most inspiring to me...

such ordinary people.

The baby on moms belly to me is most precious.

I really enjoyed these thanks for posting PH!

Richter has an entire series of paintings of rolls of toilet paper hanging on dispensers...hanging the wrong way. And the series coincides with the time of his divorce, as if to say 'THIS IS WHY I MUST LEAVE HER'.

[Homicidalheathen]

Guys awesome.