Download PDF - ARTisSpectrum

SANDRA MUELLER-DICK
Landscapes of the Mind IV Oil on Canvas 48” x 48”
niki.b’s comic book-inspired acrylic works on canvas
approach their subject from unique and enlightening
points of view. She makes use of the strong colors and
textures of modern graphic design as a means of displaying
her equally passionate love for American popular culture,
especially tailfins and gleaming bumpers. She also takes
Roy Lichtenstein’s use of the comic book panel one step
further and portrays original characters musing upon
specific moments of decision. Whether these moments are
important or trivial, harmless or devious, we have no idea.
The vital point is that niki.b is presenting to us these very
human moments in an instant of her subjects’ lives. Another
aspect of niki.b’s distinctive style is her choice of placing
various philosophical thoughts inside animals’ heads. The
aesthetic conceit of discussing ideas about human nature
and the human condition by giving the thoughts to nonhuman
characters is a long tradition in the arts. niki.b has
added a sharp-edged humor and pathos to that tradition.
Growing up under Communism as she did, niki.b valued
the visual arts, especially those which could improve her
feelings about herself and her life. She has given her
anxieties over to her animal subjects, and in doing so, sheds
new light on eternal issues of self-worth, honesty and the
capacity for enlightenment.
Websites: www.niki-b.com.pl
www.Art-Mine.com/ArtistPage/niki.b.aspx
Boston-based painter, Sandra Mueller-Dick, channels
her personal experiences and interests into murky,
ghostly visions. Though many of her works evoke figures
and landscapes, she swaths these forms in layers of
colors applied in kinetic, swirling patterns that create the
effect of peering into foggy memories. Through these
clouds, glimmers of bodies, valleys and rivers struggle
to define themselves against deep red, blue, green and
yellow mists. This theme of incomplete memory and blurry
vision emerged in Mueller-Dick’s art when her father was
diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. These canvases that never
reveal their subjects and sometimes feature blacked-out
corners represent absent memories, pieces missing from
life’s puzzle, but they also provoke active imagination.
Teetering on the edge of abstraction with often only the
faintest echoes of landscapes and bodies—many of which
are inspired by her interests in yoga and dance—Mueller-
Dick’s expressionist style presents viewers with a colorful
ghost world open to introspective exploration. These spaces
and forms, visible in outline but not filled out, invite viewers to
contribute their own partial remembrances. Owing perhaps
to her work as a gallery instructor at Boston’s Museum
of Fine Arts, her paintings mediate personal therapeutic
projects and thematic interests while remaining open to
shifting meanings and approaches. Mueller-Dick creates
spaces for our forgotten dreams by visualizing partial
memories.
Websites: www.mueller-dick.com
www.Art-Mine.com/ArtistPage/Sandra_Mueller__Dick.aspx
NIKI. B
Too Pink Acrylic on Canvas 35.5” x 35.5”
61 ArtisSpectrum