Bridget Mullen
Shape-shifting in search of a psychological charge
In wavy, undulating lines and repetitive forms, Bridget Mullen combines decisive mark-making with intuition and experimentation to conjure psychedelic compositions. Using ultra-matte Flashe paint and oil on linen, her paintings waver between abstraction and figuration, dimensionality and flatness, and solidity and fluidity. She infrequently starts with a plan; it’s more likely she begins with abstractions that get repurposed into some semblance of a figure.
Working free-associatively, Mullen searches for the subject through the process, allowing previous layers and the colors and textures of h...
In wavy, undulating lines and repetitive forms, Bridget Mullen combines decisive mark-making with intuition and experimentation to conjure psychedelic compositions. Using ultra-matte Flashe paint and oil on linen, her paintings waver between abstraction and figuration, dimensionality and flatness, and solidity and fluidity. She infrequently starts with a plan; it’s more likely she begins with abstractions that get repurposed into some semblance of a figure.
Working free-associatively, Mullen searches for the subject through the process, allowing previous layers and the colors and textures of her materials to play collaborative roles. “The goal is not to look for the subject head-on but to allow the meandering process of painting to unearth dynamic forms that can shape-shift in search of a psychological charge." Mullen offers, “Often it’s painting myself out of corners I’ve painted myself into that results in the right balance of playful and tense, mysterious and resonant, and declarative and interpretive.”
Bridget Mullen (she/her) was born in 1976 in Winona, Minnesota, USA. She currently lives and works in New York, USA.
Bridget Mullen has exhibited internationally, and has had ten solo shows. In 2022, she was awarded the prestigious Chiaro Award, an award given by the Headlands Center for the Arts to one painter each year.
Mullen’s process is unique and spontaneous. “Mine is a process of sympathetic improvisations” she says ‘I don’t pre-sketch, I repurpose abstract paintings as figurative paintings.”
