Event Review - Artist Talk - Joseph Mougel

Joseph Mougel
Artists NOW lecture series - UWM
J Robison

Being a student of Joseph Mougel, I was already familiar with some of his work. However, I was unprepared for the experience I watched at his artist talk. His mashups of photography and performance art, using various facets of his life as his inspiration, convey a depth of imagination and passion I had no idea he possessed. It was as if I encountered another artist, completely new to me.

Mougel’s time in the Marine Corps was a long-term influence on his art during the formative years of his career. His The Surplus Room was, to a fellow veteran, a cathartic release of his psyche, like a butterfly emerging from a cocoon into a brave new world of sunny skies and light breezes. Training Videos began to introduce an element of the sardonic into his world as he grew further into his element. Yello Cake completes an exploration of absurdity and paranoia in the post-9/11 era, with its fake advertising and ‘post-truth’ feel before post-truth was a phenomenon. I found it prophetic, given our world’s state of current events.

Mougel’s examinations of holes and landscape over time demonstrate growing maturity and fulfillment in his work as he began incorporating ecological issues into his artistic vocabulary. He feels an intimacy with raw earth and water, right down to his bones. He integrates himself into nature without becoming an unwelcome interloper through permanent interference in the natural order of the world. This soul-searching didn’t dilute his appreciation for the absurd, as Luscinia Xanthoplasticus demonstrated. Mougel, as ungainly bird in woodland setting, highlighted all manner of contradictions within space and place, making this piece fascinating to appreciate.

Joseph Mougel, from the performance piece Luscinia Xanthoplasticus

Newer works and projects currently in production only cement his growing legacy as he introduces new themes into his work. Salted Trees demonstrates an understanding for the unwavering cycles of life and death, while UCross: A Portrait in Place looks at cattle ranching from a perspective unfamiliar to most – the farming of grass.

Mougel’s talent and passion are infectious.I was pleased to see a part of his personality I had never noticed before. As an aficionado of both performance work and absurdity, I hope to incorporate Mougel’s ability to examine his surroundings and connect with them into my own work on this deeper level, beyond mere observation.