David Castillo Gallery is proud to present Time Bomb, Pepe Mar’s third solo exhibition with the gallery. The works in Time Bomb take their inspiration from Mar’s intuitive obsessions including thrift store shopping, science fiction, high design and fashion. Living the excitement of thrift stores, Mar’s process is the archeological research of a textural decadence and whimsical masquerade. His new bodies of work are clashes of bliss, completely open yet exercising deliberate control.  As always, using a cheerful aesthetic borne out of disturbing detritus, Mar’s work is commentary on society’s waste.  His is an emotional philosophy, an inward reflection that can only be proclaimed through amusement.

Time Bomb debuts three new bodies of work, which continue Mar’s playful investigation of the history of assemblage, painting and popular culture. Transforming a set of Papasan chairs, these large sculptures are like undetectable surfaces which become a “supermass.”  A group of abstracted gold busts made from found cornucopia baskets and encrusted in gold leaf occupy the gallery like primordial monuments.  Inspired by Greek and Roman busts, they are vestiges of all that is fleeting as you read this. In the third body of work, Mar returns to the study of painting and creates a series of large wooden panels covered with ceramic masks, executed by the artist over the last year and a half (and inspired by a ceramic mask made by one Jim Clark in 1972, naturally a thrift store find). Surrounded by vibrant colors and forms, like a Tony Duquette room, the masks materialize from a mist of hyper-saturated neon colors.

Pepe Mar was born in Mexico and lives and works in Miami, Florida. He received his BFA from California College of the Arts (CCA), San Francisco and is currently enrolled in his second year in Florida International University’s MFA program. Mar’s artwork has appeared in The New York Times, ARTnews, Art in America, Art + Auction, ArtNexus, The Artnewspaper, and Artnet. His work has been exhibited throughout the US and venues abroad and is included in major collections in the US, Europe, and Latin America. Upcoming exhibitions include The Maginot Line, curated by Dennis Scholl and the site-specific installation Time Bomb (Extended Version), curated by Melissa Diaz in the Miami Design District.