@ Watrous Gallery

HERBARIUM

Above: Joseph Mougel, Dendroleipos, 2022. Archival pigment print. 40 x 32 inches. Right: Joseph Mougel, Ideal Cedar, 2020. Archival pigment print. 28 x 20 inches.

JOSEPH MOUGEL

Milwaukee

Joseph Mougel’s Herbarium project is a series of photographs inspired by plant archives and the desire to capture and preserve things that comprise a place. Living plants, both native and introduced, are contained or surrounded by floral-patterned teacups, plastic shopping bags, darkroom equipment, and scientific instruments, and further contextualized with patterns from domestic life like wallpaper, curtains, and embroidered tablecloths.

Together these components describe narratives of transition, colonization, and the exploration of the prairie. Mougel’s photographs illustrate moments of wonder, of not fully comprehending or seeing the world as a place of magic, as well as attempts to describe and analyze nature. This tension between the miraculous and the understood describes a journey of discovery, and an environment filled with mysteries for curious people to explore.

CLASH/MELD

Above: Richard Moninski, Corbel and Joe Pye Weed, 2021. Acrylic on camouflage fabric. 34 x 26 inches. Right: Richard Moninski, Witness, 2021. Acrylic on camouflage fabric, 34 x 26 in.

RICHARD MONINSKI

Platteville

Richard Moninski’s recent work explores several themes: the systemization of nature, the decorative impulse, the choices between representation and abstraction, and the history and culture of specific places. His paintings and drawings juxtapose indigenous flora and fauna, man-made artifacts, and stylized representations of plants taken from European decorative arts traditions such as tapestry and lace-making.

Moninski often paints directly on commercially printed fabrics, usually camouflage patterns, incorporating and modifying the existing printed designs. The imagery ranges from more fully rendered objects to loose, gestural paint splatters and strokes. Why camouflage? Individual camouflage shapes are abstract, yet the overall pattern represents foliage. This duality of abstraction and representation allows for the inclusion of flat, decorative patterns and things rendered as three-dimensional forms. The resulting works take the original military or hunting context of the camouflage and bend it to a commentary on the meeting places of nature and culture.