Click thumbnail to view full image. Thumbnail may be cropped.

1. Untitled (Manufactured Utopia I: High Density Housing),
     2008, digital print on Somerset, 60” x 80”
2. Untitled (Manufactured Utopia II: High Density Housing),
     2008, digital print on Somerset, 60” x 80”
3. Untitled (Green Shelves in Forced Perspective), 2007,
     digital print on Somerset, 40” x 40”
4. Untitled (Elevated Cabinet), 2007, digital print on
     Somerset, 30” x 40”
5. Untitled (Storage Cube), 2007, digital print on
     Somerset, 30” x 30”

back to top

Click thumbnail to view full image. Thumbnail may be cropped.

1. Furniture Pallets, 2008, Coroplast with digital output on adhesive vinyl,
      24” x 24” x 3” each
2. Geodesic Storage II, 2008, Coroplast with digital output on adhesive
      vinyl, 5’ x 5’ x 5’
3. Cut, Fold, Stack, Repeat, 2006, Coroplast with digital output on
      adhesive vinyl, dimensions variable
4. Cut, Fold, Stack, Repeat, 2006, detail, 24” x 24” x 24” each and
      16” x 16” x 16”
5. Paper[Space], 2008, hand-recycled paper and wood from previous
      paper installations, dimensions variable
6. Paper[Space], 2008, detail, 6” x 6” x 1/4” each
7. Reconsidered, 2008, hand-recycled paper from previous paper
      installations, dimensions variable
8. Reconsidered, 2008, detail, 6” x 6” x 1/4” each
9. Repurpose, 2007, hand-recycled paper from previous paper
      installations, dimensions variable
10. Repurpose, 2007, detail, 6” x 6” x 1/4” each
11. Cabinet InFlux, 2006, wood, veneer, newsprint, 3’ x 3’ x 7’ 10"
12. Cabinet InFlux, 2006, interior view, wood, veneer, newsprint,
       3’ x 3’ x 7-1/2’
13. The Affected Model of a Flawed Paradigm in the H-O Scale, 2005,
        newsprint, post-it note flags, wood, 48” x 6’ x 11’
14. Re-Collection, 2004, installation of newsprint with digital output and
        post-it flags, 19’ x 50’ (3” x 3” each note)
15. Re-Collection, 2004, installation of newsprint with digital output and
        post-it flags, 19’ x 50’ (3” x 3” each note)
16. Post it(s), 2003, newsprint, digital output, 20’ x 16’ (3” x 3” each note)

back to top

Contact Information
e-mail: lmutchle@temple.edu
www.lesliemutchler.com
Please contact artist for purchases, commissions, etc.

Artist Statement
My collages, digital drawings, recycled paper and coroplast installations, stem from an investigation into consumer desires to purchase an organized lifestyle. Using catalogue glossies from Crate & Barrel, Ikea, Pottery Barn, and others, I create a hybrid-form of organization that speaks about the many tastes and design influences surrounding our consumer culture. My research focuses on furniture that functions solely as storage; it contains one’s belongings as it continues to perpetuate a want of more. I am intrigued by such a device’s ability to eliminate an accumulation of belongings into one unified object and thus the accumulation’s ability to live under a minimal guise of solidarity.

I am designing hybrid storage systems- modular pieces that grow in response to collection, yet strive to minimize such expansion. This dichotomy is significant in my work: an ever-growing accumulation versus a sincere want for containment and minimization of such. Currently, my digital drawings are composed from a reused and recycled vocabulary of ready-made furniture pieces (cut and catalogued from similar contemporary sources). By utilizing digital applications I am able to stretch, contort and warp these otherwise singular pieces into copious and complex images of architecture and landscape that challenge our expectations of accumulation and minimization on a contemporary and socioeconomic scale.

That intersection- the convergence of disorder and order, accumulation and minimization, utopian ideals and realistic notions- then becomes the unstable subject of my installation works. I strive to build structures, landscapes, and objects of perfection, utilizing paper (once fresh- now recycled) as a primary source material. These utopian structures fall continuously short- at times resolving themselves as an exercise in futility- full of almosts and blurred absolutes. But much like my modernist predecessors the work begins and ends engaged in a sincere desire to learn perfection.

Education
2002 - 2004
Tyler School of Art, Temple University, Elkins Park, PA
MFA, Printmaking

1998 - 2002
Kent State University, Kent, OH
BFA, Printmaking

Residencies
2007
Artist in Residence, Frans Masereel Centrum, Kasterlee, Belgium

Artist in Residence, The Ora Lerman Charitable Trust, Soaring Gardens, Meshoppen, PA

2006
Artist in Residence, The Ora Lerman Charitable Trust, Soaring Gardens, Meshoppen, PA

Selected Exhibitions

Solo

2008
Reconsidered, Art Annex Gallery, Forest Park Community College, St. Louis, MO

2007
Studies in Veneer and Plastic, Philadelphia International Airport, Philadelphia, PA

Repurpose, Tilt Gallery and Project Space, Portland, OR

2006-2007
Studies in Organized Living, InLiquid at the Bride, Painted Bride Art Center, Philadelphia, PA

2006
Cut, Fold, Stack, Repeat, Beverly Gallery, St. Louis, MO

Shaping Storage, Exit Gallery, Kent, OH

Cabinet InFlux, Spareroom, Baltimore, MD

Group

2008
Discrete Space, Big Medium, Austin, TX

Paper[Space], Philadelphia Art Alliance, Philadelphia, PA

Our Commodity: Sarah Frost, Juan William Chavez, Leslie Mutchler, Regional Arts Commission, St. Louis, MO

Papercuts, Falling Cow Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

Showroom: Design Philadelphia, Crane Arts Building, Philadelphia, PA

Emergent Behavior, Martin Art Gallery of the Baker Center for the Arts, Muhlenberg, PA

Recent Work: Leslie Mutchler and Jason Urban, Snowflake Gallery, St. Louis, MO

2006
Intimate and Epic, Lurie Garden, Millennium Park, Chicago, IL

Selections from the Contemporary’s Flat Files, Contemporary Art Museum, St. Louis, MO