Manfred Müller: Federal Avenue

Throughout his career Manfred Müller has made large-scale, site-specific sculptures and installations from diverse materials such as steel, wood, cement, paper, and recycled industrial machine parts. Trained as an engineering draftsman, Müller uses architecture, the industrial landscape and simple geometry to explore the relationship between objects, space and meaning. These works unite disparate elements into eloquent combinations of form and color. While his artistic practice is rooted in sculpture, Müller has consistently produced sketches and drawings that support and inform his larger works. Sometimes they are studies towards larger projects, but more often the sketches are a response to what is happening in the studio and are conceived of and executed as independent works in their own right. Employing familiar techniques on a smaller scale, Müller interrupts the paper's flat surface with incised lines and raised edges to give the drawings a sculptural three-dimensionality. These subtly nuanced changes in texture allow light to play on the surface, acting as the point of contact between drawn line and edge tension. Müller transforms the humblest of materials into objects of profound poetic beauty. These works on paper continue to serve Müller as a rich depository of ideas for his ongoing visual diary.