LAMB arts is proud to start the year 2016 with MOTHERFUCKERCHEESECUTTER, a solo show by Mariana Mauricio (b. 1983), Rio De Janeiro, Brazil.
MOTHERFUCKERCHEESECUTTER is a new body of work by Mariana Mauricio that explores the artist’s continuous interest in reshaping and exploring intrinsic definitions of use that are attributed to day to day simple objects, and from those create a new narrative that exposes, through an exceptional assemblage of materials, the multi-faceted relationships between individuals, their anxieties, and Mauricio’s own personal experience.
Driven by an almost obsessive need to investigate her surroundings, Mauricio started to explore places of consumer interaction such as supermarkets. Her visits became almost a ritual, and through these exploratory trips the artist is able to detach from the actual need of purchasing an item for its own physical attributions to finding an object that would bring attributes to her own sculptural practice. Meaning and concepts that are embedded into our consumerist society comes together throughout this exhibition.
Physical strains and stress are to be noticed in most of Mauricio’s works. It commences with the artist’s journey and own physical experience of finding and transporting those objects - from concrete slabs to paper envelops - and it continues with Mauricio’s incessant appropriations of all sorts of meanings and visual appeal, including archival imageries that refers to a detached psychological stress or ones lost or broken memory. Mauricio then reshapes into a whole new reality of its own.
Physical strains and stress are to be noticed in most of Mauricio’s works. It commences with the artist’s journey and own physical experience of finding and transporting those objects - from concrete slabs to paper envelops - and it continues with Mauricio’s incessant appropriations of all sorts of meanings and visual appeal, including archival imageries that refers to a detached psychological stress or ones lost or broken memory. Mauricio then reshapes into a whole new reality of its own.
In Jamaica with a Pink Towel, Not with a Blue Face (I am fine). Mauricio strikingly exposes that juxtaposition of meanings in a manner that is both playful and profound. At the center of the work is a blown up image of what one could perceive as the Madonna of our times, almost framed but not, almost covered but not, but yet contained within those objects which are carefully placed to push this idea and expose it to the viewer. Lying on the floor there is a cobalt pillow, with two light switches and pink container lid, here, the artist mirrors the woman image as a organic body lying on the floor almost as if discarded. In this piece, Mauricio incorporated for the first time sound to her practice. Tease Me by Chaka Demus & Pliers runs on loop coming from within this amorphic body, inviting the viewers to interact with the work
The colors as well as the formality of Mauricio’s works are highly influenced by the artist’s early exposure and appreciation of Brazilian Modernism - geometric abstraction is subtly incorporated through her oeuvre. A great admirer and avid consumer of Concrete Poetry, Mauricio constantly utilizes linguist elements, book covers, labels, advertisements to name a few, in order to generate a typographical effect and a visual vocabulary instead of focusing on the conceptualization of the words, intrinsic meanings and formal narratives, similarly to when she appropriates of the objects in the supermarket or on the streets.
The installation in the cave at LAMB, Innersprings, 2015, is perhaps the artists most audacious and personal work to day. A room with a bed, made of debris of what the artists perceives as failed works. The bed, a symbol of love and sex, of birth and death is here filled with a slideshow for a training manual of a cleaning firm with sexual imagery - as if almost to wake up the viewer to its own boredom. Navigating through her own practice and exposing such an intimate part of her process, this site and its content create a unique space of reflection.
Works by Mariana Mauricio have been shown internationally in recent years in Galeria Leme, São Paulo, Jette-Rudolph Gallery, Berlin, Frank-Suss Collection, London, Expost-Facto curated by Ana Varella, Rio de Janeiro. Her work is part of many international collections including Estrellita B. Brodsky, BGA Brazil Golden Art Collection and Didier Jutras-Aswad.