To Tame A Land
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Robert MarsTo Tame A Land2020
2020
About the Item
- Creator:Robert Mars (1969, American)
- Creation Year:2020
- Dimensions:Height: 24 in (60.96 cm)Width: 18 in (45.72 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:Napa, CA
- Reference Number:Seller: ROMX-30761stDibs: LU14425655742
Robert Mars
Juxtaposing the faces of iconic celebrities with patterns reminiscent of quilting and folk art, Robert Mars (b. 1969) considers the many facets of American popular culture through the lens of advertising.
In Mars’s mixed-media works, brand names are collaged beneath the visages of mid-century stars such as Elvis, James Dean, Marilyn Monroe and Jackie Kennedy, with neon lighting and shiny coats of resin on wood panels lending each piece the allure of a covetable consumer object.
Born in New Jersey, Mars studied at the Parsons School of Design and worked for a time as a graphic designer. His cultural mash-ups draw on imagery from his collection of vintage magazines. Combining enlarged Xerox transfers and boldly painted colors in several built-up layers, his works recall the messy remixing of everyday objects by Robert Rauschenberg as well as the explorations of mass reproduction and fame by Andy Warhol. The shape of a Chanel No. 5 bottle, a Louis Vuitton logo and a photograph of Audrey Hepburn are all plucked from mass media as relics of Americana and the obsession with luxury. Distressing the surfaces of the pieces, Mars gives them a timeworn texture, like an old advertisement that might be found on the wall of a roadside gas station, but with a surreal quality in their recontextualized subjects.
The stars and mass-media material in Mars’s work mostly have origins in the 1950s and ’60s, an age that saw the rise of celebrity endorsements during a postwar economic boom in which there were plenty of novel new products to promote. An image of Jackie Kennedy is overlaid with ad copy for Dior; a photograph of a victorious Muhammad Ali is joined with Champion Spark Plugs typography. The nostalgia here is for commerce as much as it is for people who became a brand. In the artist’s dynamic collages, the lines between what, or who, is being packaged and sold are blurred.
Mars has produced commissions for Coca-Cola, was a featured artist for a project with Kari Whitman Interiors and was chosen in 2015 for the cover of Neiman Marcus’s May Book. He has exhibited at the Evansville Museum of Art, Coral Springs Museum of Art and elsewhere.
Find Robert Mars mixed-media works, paintings and other art on 1stDibs.
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- "Make Your Own Light" Dom Pérignon Collage Composition Painting on Panel BoardBy Robert MarsLocated in New York, NYThis piece depicts the famous Dom Pérignon Champagne Bottle. Celebrating this iconic brand from the Golden Era with expressive and bold colors by capturing these moments in history, his paintings serve as vehicles for bringing the nostalgia of this sought-after brands to the world. With the use of graphic compositions, glossy textures, and rich colors Mars provided the ultimate medium in which to explore his fascination stemming from the Golden Age of American popular culture and the icons of the 1950’s and 60’s. Mars hand-painted stars in the background with clippings from magazines dating back to this era and incorporates messages from those times throughout the artwork. Creating the perfect backdrop for his statement piece, stands out exceptionally, as the Moët & Chandon logo is draped across adding an extra character of definition. Mars then layers the entire painting in epoxy resin, so the thickness of the piece pops dramatically. Finishing off the edges of the wood panel with newspaper articles and advertisements from an array of vintage magazines collected over the years. This is a one-of-a-kind piece executed on wood panel and comes ready to be displayed with hanging wire on verso, signed by the artist lower left and on verso. Art measures 40 x 30 inches Robert Mars was born in 1969 and is a graduate of Parsons School of Design in New York. At a young age, between 7 and 8 years old, he was drawn to muscle cars, custom vans, superheroes, and other icons that were relevant as a child. This idea of icons has been an obsession within his life and has continued into his adult life and throughout his artistic career, but the imagery has been refined over time. With the use of graphic compositions, glossy textures, and rich colors Mars provided the ultimate medium in which to explore his fascination stemming from the Golden Age of American popular culture and the icons of the 1950’s and 60’s. Drawing inspiration from the near-mythical fame that surrounded celebrities such as Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor, James Dean, Audrey Hepburn, Elvis Presley, and many others, before the instant and all-encompassing presence of the internet, Mars’ daring approach creates paintings with a nostalgic yet innovative vintage feel. Employing concepts rooted in abstract expressionism, Mars has expanded on his body of work in the last years to abstract compositions, finding a balance between chaos and control by precisely cutting the painted vintage newspaper into predetermined patterns with multicolored paint layers of loose and dynamic brushstrokes in order to bridge to the events of the past and anchoring each of his artwork in a particular time of history. Robert Mars taps into the feelings that emanate from his paintings which vacillate between memory and desire. The taste of nostalgia pulls the viewers towards the iconic stars and the consumerist historical subject material of Mars’ works. Mars’ sources are the very core of these dreams. Photographs of stars like Bruce Springsteen, logos of products like Coca-Cola and TIFFANY & CO., and vintage ephemera are layered beautifully with news stories of seminal events; from the death of JFK to the 1969 moonwalk. By capturing these moments in history, his paintings serve as vehicles for bringing the American brand to the world. Based on traditional quilt patterns from American history, the mix of handcraft, and the meditation of...Category
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- "I Saw The Light" CHANEL N°5 Perfume Collage Composition Painting on Panel BoardBy Robert MarsLocated in New York, NYThis piece depicts the famous CHANEL N°5 Perfume Bottle. Celebrating this iconic brand from the Golden Era with expressive and bold colors by capturing these moments in history, his paintings serve as vehicles for bringing the nostalgia of this sought-after brands to the world. With the use of graphic compositions, glossy textures, and rich colors Mars provided the ultimate medium in which to explore his fascination stemming from the Golden Age of American popular culture and the icons of the 1950’s and 60’s. Mars hand-painted Pinwheels in the background with clippings from magazines dating back to this era and incorporates messages from those times throughout the artwork. Creating the perfect backdrop for his statement piece, stands out exceptionally, as the CHANEL logo is draped across adding an extra character of definition. Mars then layers the entire painting in epoxy resin, so the thickness of the piece pops dramatically. Finishing off the edges of the wood panel with newspaper articles and advertisements from an array of vintage magazines collected over the years. This is a one-of-a-kind piece executed on wood panel and comes ready to be displayed with hanging wire on verso, signed by the artist lower right and on verso. Art measures 36 x 36 inches Robert Mars was born in 1969 and is a graduate of Parsons School of Design in New York. At a young age, between 7 and 8 years old, he was drawn to muscle cars, custom vans, superheroes, and other icons that were relevant as a child. This idea of icons has been an obsession within his life and has continued into his adult life and throughout his artistic career, but the imagery has been refined over time. With the use of graphic compositions, glossy textures, and rich colors Mars provided the ultimate medium in which to explore his fascination stemming from the Golden Age of American popular culture and the icons of the 1950’s and 60’s. Drawing inspiration from the near-mythical fame that surrounded celebrities such as Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor, James Dean, Audrey Hepburn, Elvis Presley, and many others, before the instant and all-encompassing presence of the internet, Mars’ daring approach creates paintings with a nostalgic yet innovative vintage feel. Employing concepts rooted in abstract expressionism, Mars has expanded on his body of work in the last years to abstract compositions, finding a balance between chaos and control by precisely cutting the painted vintage newspaper into predetermined patterns with multicolored paint layers of loose and dynamic brushstrokes in order to bridge to the events of the past and anchoring each of his artwork in a particular time of history. Robert Mars taps into the feelings that emanate from his paintings which vacillate between memory and desire. The taste of nostalgia pulls the viewers towards the iconic stars and the consumerist historical subject material of Mars’ works. Mars’ sources are the very core of these dreams. Photographs of stars like Bruce Springsteen, logos of products like Coca-Cola and TIFFANY & CO., and vintage ephemera are layered beautifully with news stories of seminal events; from the death of JFK to the 1969 moonwalk. By capturing these moments in history, his paintings serve as vehicles for bringing the American brand to the world. Based on traditional quilt patterns from American history, the mix of handcraft, and the meditation of...Category
2010s Pop Art Still-life Paintings
MaterialsEpoxy Resin, Mixed Media, Acrylic, Wood Panel, Newsprint