Leo Marz, Venetian Blinds and Dry Ice Always Look Futuristic, 2023
Hesper Cane
July 19, 2023
The contemporary world functions within the digital framework generating a constant information overflow and, consequentially, a transformation in our neural capacities and mechanisms. Unaware of the subtle changes induced by being continually and ceaselessly surrounded by technology and exposed to an overload of news, images, and videos, society mutates into a content-oriented construct. Regardless of media, Leo Marz's artistic practice is often rooted in the exploration of the Information Age and the subsequent data deluge, uncovering its consequences on changing both societal and personal structures.
Although known primarily as a new media artist, Leo Marz revisits traditional media, such as painting and sculpture, in his inaugural show at Gallery Wendi Norris. The exhibition Modern Office presents the artist's most recent works and ends the ten-year pause of Marz exhibiting in the U.S.
MODERN OFFICE
Mexican artist Leo Marz debuts at Gallery Wendi Norris with Modern Office, a deftly curated show showcasing seven new paintings and two sculptures, in which the artist explores the business discourse of contemporary life. Originating from a series of swift sketches, Marz gradually builds the visions that seem to exist on the verge of consciousness. Focusing on the topos of modern offices, Marz's most recent works unravel the rifts in time and space, suggesting their everyday occurrence.
Applying bold colors but fine lines, Marz defragments the figures and disrupts the composition, achieving a depiction of matter, memory, or thought dissolving. The painting It's Always the Same Story- a Scream- a Jump- You Wake Up demonstrates Marz's formula to find visual modes for the mechanisms of thinking, dreaming, remembering, and daydreaming, materializing our neural fragments. Other works, such as A Drama, highlight how Marz establishes an initial familiarity disrupted by the subtle provocation propelled by fine lines forming fragments that seem to vanish from memory.
MULTIMEDIA FLUENCY
Leo Marz attained an MFA in New Media from the Transart Institute for Creative Research and Donau University in Krems, Austria. Navigating the waters of various media, such as video, music, performance, installation, and new media, successfully, Marz's work has been exhibited worldwide, often within an institutional framework.
In Mexico City alone, Marz's work appeared in Museo de Arte Moderno, Museo Universitario de Ciencia y Arte, Museo de Arte Carrillo Gil, and Casa del Lago UNAM. Among other notable institutions that have displayed Marz's artwork are the Yucatán Biennale, Palazzo delle Arti Napoli, Hessel Museum of Art at Bard College, Steve Turner Contemporary, and Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Monterrey.
LEO MARZ AT GALLERY WENDI NORRIS
In 2022, the Museo Jumex in Mexico City hosted his latest solo exhibition titled The Ancient Incident. Contrary to the immersive installation Marz presented there, the show Modern Office marks a return to traditional media, including drawing, painting, and sculpture, as demonstrated by the works at Gallery Wendi Norris. Approaching "humans as processors of information", Marz created a visual algorithm of the (un)conscious action by contrasting, juxtaposing, and superimposing formal elements in unexpected ways.
The exhibition Modern Office will be on view at Gallery Wendi Norris in San Francisco from July 19th until September 9th, 2023.
