MICHAEL MÜLLER: PAINTINGS

The series “Schwierige Bilder” is a group of diptychs, each consisting of a larger picture in landscape format and a smaller picture in portrait format. Both parts of the diptych are hung side by side, though at different angles. In this way, the relationship between the two parts becomes both complex and unequal. In all cases, the smaller picture comes second to the larger, original work, thus acting as a form of commentary within the broader composition. Each painting in the pair took varying time to complete and were painted using different methods. This marked temporal dimension plays a decisive role in further complicating the relationship between the larger and smaller parts. For, although the larger picture came first, the second picture reproduces an earlier state of the first that has been painted over in the final version. Thus, Müller uses the means of reproduction to document and visualize a decision made during the painting process.

In the series “Verschränkte Werke,” Müller uses the analogy of entangled particles to describe the relationship between two sides of a diptych painted on glass. In quantum theory, entangled particles describe an as-yet unexplained phenomena, whereby two particles or objects are described in reference to one another though they are spatially separated—often by light-years. Changes in one object become observable in the other even though they have no means of communicating. Leaning on the quantum mechanical notion of the “freedom-of-choice loophole,” Müller argues that the degree of autonomy within abstract painting has been overestimated, and that there remain countless unknown influences, limitations, and preconditions that subtly restrict an artist’s range of choices, not to mention the physical laws of gravity and their implications for both painting and perception.

The series, “Abstrakte Autogamie” combines photography and painting; blending together themes of figuration and abstraction. In this series, photographs are printed on aluminum dibond sheets and framed behind an abstract glass painting. Though both parts of the diptych are based on the same image, they appear in a mirrored, enlarged or otherwise abstracted form, thus making their relationship at once tangible yet complex. Aside from their shared color palette and image reference, the painting and photograph behind it are conceived of as compositionally independent. The term autogamy, in the series’ title, is borrowed from the field of biology, where it describes the phenomenon of self-pollination or self-fertilization among certain plant and animal species. Müller’s “autogamies” show men and women masturbating. Müller sees the eradication of the dialectical separation between subject and object in auto-sexuality as analogous to abstraction—to painting an object that only refers to itself. Like in auto-sexuality a partner or object is often imagined—projected—from memory, thus begging the question: What is the pictorial memory of abstraction?