Monday, November 10, 2008

Marilyn Manson



MARILYN MANSON'S PAINTINGS IN INAUGURAL U.S. EXHIBITION DURING ART BASEL MIAMI 2008, PRESENTED BY GALERIE BRIGITTE SCHENK IN COLLABORATION WITH 101 EXHIBIT - A NEW GALLERY SPACE IN THE MIAMI DESIGN DISTRICT


Multi-talented artist Marilyn Manson, legendary for the cult status of his music career and persona, has simultaneously been creating a large and remarkable body of painting over the past two decades that will be revealed for the first time in the U.S. this December during Art Basel Miami. Just as Manson's lyrics are provocative, driving the expressive form of music to its limits, the artist's paintings, though aesthetically pleasing, play with the grotesque and confront the viewer with the dark side of the American Dream – its obsessions and pitfalls. This exhibition of more than twenty paintings is presented by the Cologne-based Galerie Brigitte Schenk in cooperation with 101 Exhibit, a dynamic new art space in Miami's design district. The show will remain on view through February 2009.

Trismegistus features Manson's paintings from the past eight years. Looking at the works, one enters the artist's deep, haunted world and his existential exploration of the human condition. The artist focuses on the more unpleasant and controversial sides of life – real and fictional – as conveyed through both subject matter and distorted notions of beauty. Parallels to the style and to the "sadomasochistic eroticism" of the German Expressionist painter Egon Schiele can hardly be overlooked, as David Galloway remarked in an article entitled "Gothic Revival" (ARTnews, 2007). He continued, "Manson's subjects are consistent with his bizarre and morbid image: disease, mutilation, addiction, homicide."

No comments: