Gray
Stack
Concrete
Blocks
Twelve
Flowers
Concrete |
 |
Joe
Mancuso
About
the Artist
For
more than a decade Joe Mancuso has been
finding ways to make the common
beautiful. Meticulously crafted and
laboriously assembled, his art strikes a
balance between impersonality and
individualism. Since the late 1970's, a
fascination with all art media has been
evident in Mancuso's work. He has
uncovered the hidden beauty and
significance of industrial debris and
readymade building materials.This
refreshingly honest understanding of
humble materials has allowed the artist
to create elegant art objects from latex
paint, newspaper, concrete, bricks, and
cinderblocks. Materials are chosen for
their physicality and nature and arranged
in grandiose configurations. the artist's
mathematical preparations, rigorous
patterning and complex construction
techniques appear at odds with the use of
found objects, but the artist resolves
this paradox in ways that are infinitely
varied and enriching. As his sculptures
question the floor, his paintings
challenge the need for walls. Mancuso
uses a restrained palette-whites, grays,
and blacks, with accents of muted reds.
The round and oval shaped canvases appear
built of constructed from layers of paint
over newsprint. With exacting restraint
and considerable understatement Joe
Mancuso proves again and again that less
is indeed more. |
