July 17, 2019 1130 PM
MARFA – Wrong Gallery is pleased to present Extensions and Other Dimensions, an exhibition of new visual works by Rob Mazurek. This is Mazurek’s first solo exhibition in Marfa since Marfa Loops Shouts and Hollers at Marfa Book Company in 2015. The opening reception is from 6 to 9 p.m. on Friday, July 19.
An internationally acclaimed musician and composer, Mazurek has maintained a serious visual arts practice for many years. In both sonic and visual realms, his output is prolific. For Extensions and Other Dimensions, Mazurek presents work that represents the full range of his artistic practice: installation, sculpture, sound, and two-dimensional pieces that incorporate canvas, screen, paper, plaster and paint.
For those familiar with his music, the attitude, sensibility, and craft in his visual work will come as no surprise, exuding the same combination of neo-expressive clarity and dense materiality, sometimes in corrosive collision, at other times in stark harmony. Gesture is paramount: Mazurek’s hand is always apparent, always engaged, like his trumpet sound, in which one feels the body intimately shaping the melody. His visual works embody breath and hand shaping light, surface, color and line.
Mazurek began making his Lines series, for Marfa Loops Shouts and Hollers, in painted paper and wire. He continued to develop the series in powder coated steel and neon for his solo exhibition, The Shaping Light, at Chicago’s Audible Gallery in 2017. For Extensions and Other Dimensions, Mazurek continues his Lines series with powder coated steel in various arrays, manipulated in subtle, undulating shapes in specific color combinations.
Mazurek’s visual work has garnered attention with international solo and group exhibitions, screenings, installations, and artist residencies. His multi-media projects have been supported by major arts institutions including: the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts (Chicago, IL), Helen Coburn Meier and Tim Meier Foundation (Chicago, IL), The Andy Warhol Museum (Pittsburgh, PA), and the Robert D. Bielecki Foundation (New York, NY). In 2018, Harmonipan Editions released Marfa Loops Shouts and Hollers, a book which catalogues the 2015 Marfa Book Co. show and includes essays by John Corbett, Tiago Mesquita, and Tim Johnson.
Mazurek has shown his work at locations throughout the United States, South America and Europe, including at: URDLA Centre International Estampe & Livre (Lyon, France), Novas Frequências (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), Galleria Coletivo (São Paulo, Brazil), and Abbaye Royal de Fontevraud (Anjou, France). His solo show, Constellation Scores, was featured as part of the 2017 Biennale de Lyon Focus Series. His paintings, part of a series titled Rothko Scores, hang on the office walls at Rothko Chapel (Houston, TX). In November 2019, Meccaniche Della Meraviglia will present a solo exhibition of sight-specific work by Mazurek at the 16th century Palazzo Martinengo Colleioni di Malpaga (Brescia, Italy).
Extensions and Other Dimensions is being presented in conjunction with Desert Encrypts: Volume 2, a three-day art and music event presented by Marfa Book Company. Desert Encrypts: Volume 2 will be held at the Crowley Theater and the Arena at the Chinati Foundation in Marfa, TX from July 26-28, 2019.
