Mathieu MercierEverything But The Kitchen Sink

Lamps, furniture, bicycles, typefaces, museum plinths – the work of Mathieu Mercier, born in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine in 1970, resident in Paris and winner of the Prix Marcel Duchamp (2003), moves with assurance between art and everyday culture. In doing so he repeatedly draws on the work of his heroes Marcel Duchamp and Piet Mondrian. Yet Mathieu Mercier has no wish to make inaccessible art; he wants works that are “first of all immediately descriptive and appealing.” The banal everyday objects he stages are indeed, at first, simply beautiful. In this connection Mercier speaks of “sublimation,” of a process of refinement that raises objects to a higher plane. This deliberate dislocation, the permanent exchange between high and low, raises the question of the status of things between functionality and artistic freedom from purpose. Mathieu Mercier thus skilfully reflects on the concepts of twentieth-century Western culture in the field of tension between modern architecture, design and the visual arts.

Exhibitions:
LOK Kunstmuseum St. Gallen, 23/8 – 9/11/2014
Villa Merkel Esslingen, 13/12/2014 – 22/2/2015