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Lot Essay
Untitled (Spiritual Awakening) is a superb example of the vivid—and often wry—fusion of text and image that forms the basis of Joel Mesler’s artistic practice. Painted in 2022 and spanning an impressive width of over two metres, the work pulsates with tropical heat and is emblazoned with the titular words ‘Spiritual Awakening’. Rendered in plump curlicued twists, the letters float against a verdant dreamscape of palm leaves and fronds. Like many of the Los Angeles-born artist’s most celebrated paintings, the scene is conjured from fraught memories of his own childhood—namely the traumatic breakdown of his parents’ marriage. Here, childlike imagination runs wild against a beguiling backdrop of warm Californian sun and glimpses of a glittering swimming pool. A snake coils over the canvas, forming a typography of its own, and staring out from the centre of the composition is a pair of pale yellow eyes.
Mesler traces his signature vibrant style to memorable, if troubling, early experiences at the Beverly Hills Hotel on Sunset Boulevard. He recalls one day in particular, witnessing his father suffer the breakdown that would precipitate his parents’ divorce over a meal in the hotel restaurant. The iconic Martinique banana-leaf décor remains etched in his memory: ‘I remembered scratching the wallpaper’, he said, ‘having it in my nails’ (J. Mesler, quoted in B. Kachka, ‘How an Art Dealer Became an Up-and-Coming Painter’, The New York Times Style Magazine, 19 June 2018). Featuring naïve shapes and brightly-coloured animals, the artist’s paintings also return to the jungle worlds displayed in his childhood bedroom wallpaper. Untitled (Spiritual Awakening) bears the strange and fantastical quality of a dream, melding real and imagined images, words, and symbols within hypnotic swirls. At the base of the canvas, a chocolate sprinkle doughnut floats like an inflatable pool ring over turquoise water.
While the luscious environments of his paintings evoke the Tahitian landscapes of Paul Gauguin or exotic jungles by Henri Rousseau, Mesler’s graphic use of text forms a strong dialogue with American Pop and conceptual artists of the twentieth century. The bold, tubular lettering displays the influence of advertising typography and, employing quippy, satirical adages, he draws parallels with Ed Ruscha and Christopher Wool—the former was also strongly inspired by cool Southern Californian aesthetics and tropes. For Mesler, ‘Spiritual Awakening’ constitutes both a play on a contemporary, highly therapeutic Los Angeles vernacular, and his own recovery from alcoholism. ‘[Sobriety] shifted my mindset to such an extreme that it completely changed my life’, he has said, ‘like a spiritual awakening’ (J. Mesler, quoted in M. Eisler, ‘Joel Mesler: What Lies Beneath The Eye Candy’, LUX Magazine, August 2022).
Mesler traces his signature vibrant style to memorable, if troubling, early experiences at the Beverly Hills Hotel on Sunset Boulevard. He recalls one day in particular, witnessing his father suffer the breakdown that would precipitate his parents’ divorce over a meal in the hotel restaurant. The iconic Martinique banana-leaf décor remains etched in his memory: ‘I remembered scratching the wallpaper’, he said, ‘having it in my nails’ (J. Mesler, quoted in B. Kachka, ‘How an Art Dealer Became an Up-and-Coming Painter’, The New York Times Style Magazine, 19 June 2018). Featuring naïve shapes and brightly-coloured animals, the artist’s paintings also return to the jungle worlds displayed in his childhood bedroom wallpaper. Untitled (Spiritual Awakening) bears the strange and fantastical quality of a dream, melding real and imagined images, words, and symbols within hypnotic swirls. At the base of the canvas, a chocolate sprinkle doughnut floats like an inflatable pool ring over turquoise water.
While the luscious environments of his paintings evoke the Tahitian landscapes of Paul Gauguin or exotic jungles by Henri Rousseau, Mesler’s graphic use of text forms a strong dialogue with American Pop and conceptual artists of the twentieth century. The bold, tubular lettering displays the influence of advertising typography and, employing quippy, satirical adages, he draws parallels with Ed Ruscha and Christopher Wool—the former was also strongly inspired by cool Southern Californian aesthetics and tropes. For Mesler, ‘Spiritual Awakening’ constitutes both a play on a contemporary, highly therapeutic Los Angeles vernacular, and his own recovery from alcoholism. ‘[Sobriety] shifted my mindset to such an extreme that it completely changed my life’, he has said, ‘like a spiritual awakening’ (J. Mesler, quoted in M. Eisler, ‘Joel Mesler: What Lies Beneath The Eye Candy’, LUX Magazine, August 2022).