Mark Starling
Finish
January 13 - February 11, 2018
315 Gallery is pleased to present Finish, an installation of new work by Brooklyn based artist Mark Starling. The show consists of three modified casket lids, a large-scale painting on Formica, and a series of drawings and collages all made within the past year and a half. This is Starling’s first solo exhibition with the gallery.
With this new body of work Starling continues his investigation of funerary presentation and the related themes of time, comfort, anxiety, and the mourning process as ritual for closure. The artist grew up above his family’s funeral home in Harlem, Georgia, and involves this biography and maker’s sensibility into these meditations on death and renewal.
Four large freestanding walls intersect the gallery and describe a vault-like atmosphere. Three casket lids are mounted on these, reassigned from their original, horizontal function of encasing the deceased, to now face the viewer at eye level. Working each through a multitude of mediums and processes, the lids transcend the interchangeability of their standardized manufacture, and assume unique characters.
Framed between these walls is Black Calendar, a large painting of Formica and mixed materials. Similar to the casket lid pieces, the expressive building and eroding of the materials highlight the complex hubris of quantifying life and death as philosophical and conceptual binaries. Small irregular cut-outs of the lamination have been reassembled on the surface to expose the wall behind it. These horizontally punctuated chips seem to suggest the counting and threading of time.
Along with the related drawings, Starling uses process and the behavior of materials to reconcile his artistic subjectivity with the comedy of death. Finish is both the veneer applied to any surface in order to preserve it, but also, the proverbial end of the road.
Mark Starling Black Calendar, 2017 Formica, epoxy putty, canvas, acrylic paint, dye, colored pencil, wax crayon, oil pastel, charcoal, resin, 24k gold leaf, oil paint, and industrial adhesive in a maple frame 83.5 x 67.5 x 2.5 inches
Mark Starling Desert Road Trip, 2018 Acrylic paint, pen, colored pencil, oil pastel, epoxy putty and wax on cotton rag paper 32 x 25 x 2 inches
Mark Starling Red Hot Wave Rider, 2017 Crushed red pepper flakes, dye, clay, resin, oil paint, oil stick, acrylic, wax, colored pencil, polyurethane and iridescent powder on steel casket lid 56 x 30 x 8 inches
Mark Starling Semi Sweet Solace, 2017 Oreo cookies, dye, clay, resin, oil paint, oil stick, acrylic, wax, colored pencil, polyurethane, glass beads, epoxy putty and iridescent powder on steel casket lid 55.5 x 28 x 7.5 inches
Mark Starling The Comedy of Death (Death is for the Living), 2017 Plastic cast belly button, clay, resin, flocking fiber, polyurethane, oil paint, acrylic paint and mica powder on steel casket lid 57 x 28 x 7.5 inches
Mark Starling January, 2018 Dye, black pepper, salt, oil pastel, 24k gold leaf, colored pencil, acrylic paint, Formica, adhesive and walnut on cotton rag paper 30.75 x 23.5 inches
Mark Starling Ladder to Comfort, 2017 Napkin, dye, magazine, lottery ticket, washers, Benadryl packaging, oil paint, acrylic paint, cardboard, apstel, resin, epoxy and polystyrene mounted on masonite 35 x 20 x 1.5 inches
Mark Starling Spicy Obit, 2017 Rose printed napkin, crushed red pepper flakes, dye, lottery ticket, newspaper, magazine, oil paint, acrylic paint, resin, industrial adhesive and polystyrene mounted on masonite 35 x 22 x 1.5 inches
Mark Starling (b. 1987, Harlem, GA) lives and works in Brooklyn, NY. He received his BFA from University of Georgia, Lamar Dodd School of Art, Athens, GA in 2011 and received his MFA from Yale University School of Art, New Haven, CT in 2014. His recent two person shows include In Time at 315 Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, 2016; Cheryl Bentley/Mark Starling at Junior Projects, New York, NY, 2015. His recent group shows include Beholder's Share at 315 Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, 2016; NUTUREart Fall Benefit at Pierogi Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, 2015; The Landscape Changes 30 Times at Anahita Art Gallery, Tehran, Iran, 2015; Forced Collaboration II at Artspace, New Haven, CT, 2014; Yale Sculpture 2014 at Storefront Ten Eyck, Brooklyn, NY, 2014; Very Yes at Yale School of Art.