MARY WEATHERFORD

Weatherford’s ‘The Flaying of Marsyas’ series is on view at the Museo di Palazzo Grimani, Venice, through November 27. The paintings are inspired by Titian’s late-period masterpiece of 1570–76, held in the collection of the Archdiocesan Museum Kroměříž, Czech Republic. Titian’s unsettling painting depicts Ovid’s version of the gruesome myth in which Apollo flays the satyr Marsyas after defeating him in a music contest. ‘I brought the myth to the present day using neon,” notes Weatherford, “alluding to destiny, haughtiness, and the relationship between human and divine.’

The Epilogue monoprints are a postscript to Weatherford’s paintings in Venice. They are made in collaboration with Farrington Press in the remote high desert near Joshua Tree, California. Founded by master printer Kyle Simon, the press operates off-grid and relies on solar power.

These works are made in a process developed by Weatherford and Simon. First, Weatherford paints onto a wood block. The wet image is transferred to the paper by a hydraulic press that applies 100 tons of pressure. At a 6,000-foot elevation and nearly zero humidity, the paint dries quickly, resulting in unique, unrepeatable compositions of detail and subtlety, often revealing the very grain of the wood plate itself.