Before I start the profile, I want to make sure that I let everyone know that I have added Mic to the site without her permission. I needed some content, so I wrote for an hour or two. This shouldn’t be considered a “true ” look at her work. Hopefully in the near future I’ll contact her to do a full interview.
The first artist that kennethcurtis.com would profile seemed like an easy one. I chose my longtime friend and mentor, Mic Muhlbauer. I’ve known her for about 21 years and she was one of my first professors when I entered undergrad and I am still as impressed with her work as I was the first time that I saw it so long ago. Though retired now, she lives a comfortable life following the life of an artist in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Mic’s main body of work contains a playful feel that embraces caricature”ism” melded with realism. Looking at her work you get a sense of stepping into her life as she lived it. I think that’s what makes it so interesting to me that I feel as if I’m getting a glimpse into her life. Even the people that are portrayed in her work seem to remind me of people that I realize that I don’t know, but maybe have seen somewhere. Maybe these unnamed people remind me of someone that I have known in my life.
Discussing Mic’s painting’s special knack of bringing the viewer into her world is to me, unique, but she has also moved to other types of work as well. She has a whole body of work that is 3D or sculptural. I’m the first to say that I am in no way an expert in castings or 3D, but from I can see in Mic’s sculptural work has the same basic playfulness that her paintings do.