Marc Burckhardt: Mythmaker

Marc Burckhardt, Himmelblick, 2012, acrylic and oil on wood panel, 10” x 10.”

Mindy Solomon Gallery - Miami

By Denise Colson

Mark Burckhardt’s latest series “Mythmaker” is on view at the Mindy Solomon Gallery in Miami’s Wynwood Art District. In these works, he utilizes myth as a vehicle for exploring themes that are already traditional in his body of works: love, sex, the endless controversy between good and evil. Each work of “Mythmaker” is a metaphor for issues related to the human condition. An abandoned scull in whose eye sockets a birds’ nest could refer to mortality and uncertainty about the future, but it is also a kind of chant for hope and rebirth. “I utilize the potent blend of romanticism and propaganda embedded in classical Western visual forms to ‘rediscover’ the personal and moral meaning in these genres and to transform the familiar into the intimate,” he says.

Raised in Waco, Texas, in a Southern Baptist environment, Burckhardt spent most of his summers in Europe, traveling with his parents. Those worlds shaped his notion of culture and his art. He admits being influenced by Flemish masters, Byzantine art, Surrealism, Mexican retablos and other expressions of naïve and folk art. His creative process involves collection of found wood and other materials that recall past lives. More than simply paintings, his works seem like relics, ancient objects with a history behind them, artifacts to keep forever. Through July 26, 2014.