Peter Mars Bio
(short version pdf)
Peter Mars Bio (long version pdf) |
“See
a sign and you hear America singing.”—Walt Whitman |
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Peter Mars has been
the leader of Chicago’s
Avant Pop Movement for the past fifteen years. Combining
avant-garde innovation with a deep Pop Art sensibility,
Mars fuses and confuses the traditional distinctions between
high culture and low art. The artist’s sensibilities
fall somewhere between Dada and Pop, “In that area
where nonsense and popular culture so frequently meet.”
“Leader of Chicago’s
Avant Pop Movement” Chicago
Sun Times
Using the joy and
nostalgia that can be found in everyday objects, Mars
explores American culture, the passage of time, and the
icons that each period adopts as its own. Billboard advertisements
with years of old ads peeling through, outmoded wallpaper
designs overprinted with modern icons, recognizable typography
overlaps young female faces, antique Coca Cola logos
juxtaposed with a fresh-faced Elvis —each elicits
a multiplicity of American eras and cultural identities.
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"Witty and excitingly
of the moment" New
Orleans Times Picayune
Much of Mars’
work reflects the pop culture of his childhood in the 1960s
and 70s, notably the idealized American family, comic book
figures, and “space age” invention. In magazine
advertising, product design, and television programming Mars
finds a fertile language with which to work. To say that Mars
appropriates these images, however, does not capture the rich
exchange of ideas that takes place on canvas. These are dialogues,
every bit as much “collaborations” as the work
Mars created with notable “outsider” artists Howard
Finster, R.A. Miller, Wesley Willis and “Big Al”
Taplet.
Born in Portland, Oregon in 1959, Peter Mars began collecting
at an early age: match packs, comic books, baseball cards,
arrowheads, coins and later, motorcycles. Rather than striving
to compile exhaustive collections, Mars sought “separate
images of beauty,” small treasures that “tell
the story of American popular culture.”
Using silkscreen as his medium of choice, Mars is able to
engage his subject matter in a way that lets images
“speak their own language.” In juxtaposition, they
agree or disagree, emphasize or interrupt, as if in animated
conversation. The result is textured, complex, wry, and always
more than the sum of its parts. |
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“Don’t
Be Blue”
original mm on paper
30”x22” |
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"A mixture of spiritual consumerism,
banality, and resonant mystery" New
Orleans Art Review
Peter Mars’ work appears in galleries from coast to coast
and can be found in the collections of: Nate Berkus, Oprah’s
Interior Designer, Sheryl Crow, Michael Jordan, Betsey Johnson,
Halo Industries, Tow Records, Elisa Behnk, Former Director of
Public Information and Marketing for The Carnegie, Warhol and
MOMA Museums and Mr. & Mrs. John Heinz Waller.
Articulate
and amusing, Peter Mars speaks with unassuming clarity about
his inspirations, education and collaborations:
On images and objects:
Found objects are fun! “It was a running joke in our family
that I never looked up. Wherever I was as a kid I was always looking
down at the ground, looking for stuff—arrowheads, pennies,
agates—I was always on the lookout for this kind of treasure.
I still draw lots of inspiration from these things we find in
our everyday life, things we see all around us.”
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“space age”:
“I loved TV shows like Lost in Space, and Fireball
XL-5. I particularly liked the robot on Lost in Space.
I remember how thrilled I was when President Kennedy came
on TV and promised us that soon we would each have our
own personal robot. I remember how he said we were gonna
have robots to walk the dog and everything! I just couldn’t
wait to grow up so I could start to work with my robot.
When that didn’t happen, I was sad.”
On printmaking:
“Right away I loved the feeling
of working with silk and ink and that sense of excitement
never seems to fade. I love the high spinning sound you
hear when you pull the ink across the silk. But most
of all, I love that final breathtaking moment when you
lift the screen from the paper and the image appears,
as if by magic!” |
Knight Avenger
Size: 22"x30" |
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“A master craftsman, who will teach you his closely guarded
secrets, is very hard to find, so I was very fortunate when an
artist friend introduced me to Dale Milford, a master printmaker
working for the New Orleans Contemporary Arts Center. Milford
was the only one who generously shared his many years of knowledge
and skills… he let me spend countless hours in his shop,
learning all the processes and methods he knew.”
On music:
Pop music—“In the past, I would go into my Chicago
neighborhood where House Music and DJ culture originated. Music
has always been a major part of my life and artistic endeavors.
I’ve played in bands all my life and was heavily involved
in the JUXTAPOZ and House Music Culture where I hosted hundreds
of DJ events. With my art, I feel I am juxtaposing, sampling recombining,
DJ-ing the visuals. To me music and painting are a lot alike and
I think a painting can be as easy to understand as a song on the
radio. If I like it, and it feels good to me, I want to hear it
again. That’s what makes it a good song or a good painting.
To me, music and painting are a lot alike.” |
“Vintage
Dean”
original mm on paper
20”x15” |
On
inspiration:
“Often I will dream about art and specific paintings
will come to me in explicit detail. Other times, I’ll
receive an idea for a unique combination of colors…
I often use meditation to get inspired and to stay in touch
with my creativity.”
“When I was living in New Orleans, I came upon a print
by Alexander Calder that totally changed the direction
of my art. I was drawn in by its big broad flat sweeping strokes
of color. When I learned that it was a serigraph, I said
to myself, okay, I have to learn how to do that, whatever it is.”
On
Collaboration:
Howard Finster:
“In the early 80’s I met Howard Finster, the grandfather of the
American Outsider movement, and we worked together for many years until his
death in 1999."
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“One year Howard did a poster for
a show and on it he wrote, It is fun to work with Earth’s
People, so he knew how different he was. He was so inspiring
and his enthusiasm for life and art were absolutely contagious.
He loved all the same pop culture and iconic imagery that
I did…so we related on all of that. Eventually as
the years passed, we started collaborating on artworks.
“I had found a bunch of really cool display materials
that were being thrown out of an old paper goods factory.
They were these funny signs that read Ever-Krisp Potato
Chip Company, in a red, white and blue, 1940s style logo.
I took these discarded signs, added some of my images and
then gave them to Howard. We both tapped into this whole
red white and blue thing. We both loved to drink Coca Cola
and interpreted anything Coke as representing America. The
red and white flow of the Coke logo is like a waving American
flag, or as Howard and I saw it, America’s National
Logo. (This was before his American Flag series).”
“Howard’s work is jam packed with references
to Popular Culture. He loved Elvis, Marilyn, Hank Williams,
Coca Cola, Ben Franklin and the Mona Lisa. So in many ways, we were worlds apart,
but spoke the same language. We were able to communicate like two space aliens
that find each other on a distant planet.” |
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Wesley Willis:
“I knew Wesley for many years and we used to hang out
together above the old Genesis Art Store in Chicago. I would
create a silkscreen of logos and TV characters first and then
Wesley would write his lyrics from the ‘Art Joyride’
tour, literally on top of my artwork.”
They are very simple… hilarious and scary, all at the
same time. He drew pictures of billboards, complete with slogans…
he was very Avant Pop…he would end a lot of his songs
and artwork with a corporate sales slogan. He would scream
out in some kind of extreme punk growl, Magnavox: the quality
goes in before the name goes on. I think ultimately this is
why the Beastie Boys found his work so compelling and why they
chose to collaborate with him. In my mind their music is pure
Pop Art, and I think they saw that Wesley had this going on,
to the extreme.” |
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R.A. Miller:
“Ruben Miller’s primary art form is the tin
whirligig and life size figures or what most would consider
lawn art. He utilizes whatever materials are at hand: house
paint, markers, cardboard scraps, metal and wood. He is
totally unafraid to take a marker, draw crudely fashioned
pictures of snakes, angels, devils and dinosaurs onto a
piece of board, hang it on the wall and say it’s a
painting. This takes a lot of guts and I really admire that.
I especially learned from collaborating with him, fearlessness
to move ahead and into un-proven areas, without second guessing
myself. His drawings look like they were done by a five
year old, but they have the wisdom and sagacity of an old
man. They are incredibly powerful images because of that.
My favorite Miller in my collection is a painting of the
devil, titled ‘Nighttime is Devil Time,’ but
that is more telling of me, than of Miller. |
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“Big
Al” Taplet:
“Big Al Taplet is a New Orleans
Shoe Shine Man and Folk
artist. He is called ‘Big Al’
because he was born a few minutes before his twin brother, ‘Little
Al.’. In a town full of characters, ‘Big Al’ is
one of the most loved. His booming laugh, wall-to-wall smile and
his storytelling abilities, are unmatched. I meet him at the beginning
of my art career and was initially attracted to his personality,
but as I delved into his artistic methods, I started to see his artwork
as completely Outsider Avant Pop” “His paintings
are mostly pictures of shoes with messages about proper shoe-care.
‘Treat ‘em right, and they’ll stay tight, there’s
nothing so fine as a good Shoe Shine’. They are very fun,
humorous and the ultimate Pop Art because it is actual advertising.
When we collaborated, I would silkscreen something like the word “Special
!” and then have Big Al put his shoe ads all over my images.
The combination was magical for us both.” |
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On his own art:
“If you look at the collaborations between Warhol and Basquiat,
you will understand what my art is about. In the mid-to-late 80s,
with the death of these two leaders, I felt this was “my
place”. Like the trail of breadcrumbs left by the advance
party, these previous explorers had ventured this far into the
unexplained forest and the next generation of Pop Artists would
need to start from where they left off.”
“I was coming up right behind them and I would start at
the end of their trail. This was and is, Avant Pop. Just a carrying
on…with the troops continuing to march into unknown territory
and with any military venture… you have to be fearless in
order to accomplish great things”. |
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Exhibitions: |
| 2005
2005
2004 – present
2004 – present
2004 – present
2004 – present
1988 – present
1988 – present
1986 – 2003
1994
1987
1986
1986
1986
1985 – 1987
1984 – 1986
1982 – 1985 |
Pop International,
New York, NY
Hallmark Gallery, La Jolla, CA
Steven DeBottis Gallery,
West Chester, PA
Louis Aronow Galleries, San Francisco
and Sausalito, CA
Richmond Ermet Aids Foundation,
San Francisco, CA
La Fond Galleries, Pittsburgh,
PA
Mars Gallery, Chicago, IL
Thirdstone Gallery, Saugatuck,
MI
Peligro Gallery, New Orleans,
LA
Art and Artists, Washington, DC
Dinnerware Gallery, Tucson, AZ
1988
East Ashland Gallery, Phoenix, AZ
Kisker Fine Art, Scottsdale, AZ
Diverse
Works, Houston, TX
G.V.G. Gallery, Houston, TX
X-Art Gallery, New
Orleans, LA
Contemporary Arts Center,
New Orleans, LA |
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Articles and Publications: |
| Chicago Sun Times – February
2004
Veranda Magazine, Nate
Berkus Residence, “Not
Your Mother’s Home.” May-June 2003
Chicago Journal – July
4, 2002
New Orleans Times Picayune – February
1987, March/April 1997
New Orleans Art Review - March/April 1997
Phoenix Downtown – February
1995
Inside Chicago July/August 1991
New Orleans Gambit, “Klassy
Kitch”-
October, 1991
Chicago Magazine – January
1991
Chicago Tribune - July 5, 1989 |
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Partial List of Private and Public Collections: |
| Frank Kozik
Sheryl
Crow
Michael Jordan
Elisa Behnk
Nate Berkus
Alter Image, Inc.
Buzz Company, Inc.
Renee Case & Associates
Event Masters, Inc.
Strictly Hype Records, Inc.
Tow Records, Inc.
UPSHOT
Girl Rock Productions
Luxe Communications
Halo Industries, Inc.
Titanium Design, Inc.
Laso Corporation
Wexford Bank Group
GM Productions
Bigsby & Kruthers, Inc.
Incognito Design, Inc.
Draft Worldwide
Mr & Mrs John Heinz Waller
Deloitte and Touche
Circuit City
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