PATRICK CARLIN MOHUNDRO

Flower Gardner, yokefellow

NADA New York
booth 41

Thursday thru Sunday
May 2 - May 5, 2024

Patrick Carlin Mohundro, Prison of Socrates, 11 1⁄8 x 14 inches, stained glass and porcelain, 2024

Flower Gardner is an ordinary man, a companion; a fellow labourer, a person who works at the same task as another—a yokefellow.

Tending the soil. A healthy soil is the basis of any garden. Knowing the disposition of the soil helps to maintain a solid base for growth and lush greenery. The essence of soil is in the interconnectedness of the elements that construct it and keep it alive and healthy. These include ingredients such as water, minerals, micro-organisms, and the atmosphere. Together, the components work to create and maintain a favorable environment, an ecosystem to thrive in.

Planting seeds, providing nutrients. Artist-run initiatives are an essential part of the ecosystem of the art world. Functioning in a wilder area between the junctions of studio practices and institutionalized art spaces, the members of these initiatives, spaces, and organizations often perform multiple roles as not only artists, but as producers, technicians, gallerists, communications managers, and curators. Patrick Carlin Mohundro has been running P.A.D. [Project Art Distribution] in New York City since 2017, while maintaining a dedicated studio practice and, also, nurturing an expanded community and network among artists. Mohundro has been a member of Essex Flowers since August 2023.

Maintaining a healthy growing area. At NADA, Essex Flowers presents a solo project by Mohundro. Flower Gardner, yokefellow brings together two of his most recent bodies of work, each emphasizing an idiosyncratic approach to stained glass work. Becoming fascinated by the painterly qualities of stained glass, Mohundro has been working on the material with respect and care, introducing it to new forms while also letting the material be. Flower Gardner, yokefellow includes both landscape-like ‘canvases’ made from stained glass and porcelain, as well as ‘flowers’ made from glass shards surrounding hammers and nails.

Giving space for the unknown. All kinds of things can and do pop up from the soil. This is inevitable once the previous principle of maintaining a supportive growing environment has been followed. In the art ecosystem, artist-run spaces often appear as the most fertile of gardens. These areas, that are not fertilized by the art market or institutions, are potential plots for sprouts towards the unknown, such as experimental practices and projects. In these gardens community may be cultivated through the nurturing of collective discussion, collaboration, and friendships, rather than encouraging individuality and competition.

Being generous with harvest. Mohundro’s implementations of stained glass offer the viewer various layers of interpretation: one may think about the idea of painting as a window, perhaps the medieval use of stained glass, or simply linger in the beauty of the material. Alongside the canvases, Mohundro presents ‘flowers’ constructed out of glass shards and nails. Fragile yet potentially dangerous, the field of flowers nods to the system of power relations rigorously maintained within the art world. This arises particularly through the sculpture sporting the form of both a hammer and a flower. At the Essex Flowers NADA booth, as well as through his active participation in the artist-run scene in New York City, Mohundro works to cultivate an ecosystem for all players to thrive in.

Text by Elina Suoyrjö.

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Patrick Carlin Mohundro lives and works in New York. He is from Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and holds an MFA from Hunter College (2019). He is the founder of P.A.D. and has been a member of Essex Flowers since August 2023.

Elina Suoyrjö is a curator, writer and researcher based in Brooklyn.

Essex Flowers is a New York City based artist-run cooperative project space. Over the past four years the group has mounted over 50 exhibitions with a focus on emerging and contemporary art. Essex Flowers, which retains its name from its first home in the basement of the eponymous flower shop on Grand Street, opened the fall season of 2016 in a new 300 square foot storefront gallery located at 19 Monroe St at the intersection of Chinatown, Two Bridges, and The Lower East Side neighborhoods in Manhattan.