Overview

The sculptural practice of Yeni Mao engages in issues of fragmentation through equations of body and architecture. Mao pits the physical and psychological properties of restraint, domination and order against the chaos of the visceral human condition. The works are cyborg constructions.They play with architectonic suggestiveness, placing importance on the negative space, the absence, through a circumstantial framework. Various components and visual languages- expressions of craft, material building systems and modes of display- provide a sounding board of information.

 

Working with the agency of materials, objects and building systems, Mao emphasizes the tension between both their embedded and perceived significance. In an ongoing dialogue with the significance of material production history, the alteration of those materials becomes a medium for language or narrative. Mao layers his own personal histories over the expansiveness of these concerns, most recently the projects are based in family mythologies. He consistently references his surroundings, drawing from the colonial amalgamation of processes and materials and their relationship with contemporary object production. Through fragmentation and de-contextualization, exploding the construction into components, Yeni Mao links our own personal cultural fusion and displacement with the way we construct our environment.

 

Yeni Mao (b. 1971, CAN) was born in Guelph, Canada, and spent his developmental years in the United States, Sweden and Taiwan. He received a BFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and subsequently trained in foundry work in California, and the architectural industries of New York. In 2016, Mao relocated to Mexico City.

Biography

Born in Guelph, Canada in 1971

Lives and works in Mexico City, Mexico

 

Education

 

1995 Artworks Foundry, Berkeley, USA
1993

BFA, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, USA

 

Solo Exhibitions

 

2022

Campeche, ‘Yerba Mala’, Mexico City, MX

2021

Co-Lab Projects, ‘will you meet me by the river’s edge’, Austin, USA

 

Fierman, ‘I desire the strength of nine tigers’, New York, USA

2019

PAOS GDL, ‘vol. 2: cabal, with Gamma Galería’, Guadalajara, MX 

2018

guadalajara90210, ‘vol. 1: cowboys’, Guadalajara, MX

2017

Casa Lu, ‘Ripple and Shear’, Mexico City, MX

2015

Second Street Gallery, ‘The Conqueror’, Charlottesville, USA

2014

Munch Gallery, ‘Regatta’, New York, USA

 

 Zidoun-Bossuyt, ‘Whiskey Papa’, Luxembourg, LU

 2013  Flash Atöyle, ‘1725 Sokak No.43’, Izmir, TR
2011 Collette Blanchard Gallery, ‘Dead Reckoning’, New York, USA
Works
  • fig 21.1 Calle Ignacio Manuel Altamirano 268
    Yeni Mao
    fig 21.1 Calle Ignacio Manuel Altamirano 268, 2021
    Copper plated steel with wax finish
    25.4 x 25.4 x 9.5 cm
    10 x 10 x 3 3/4 in
    Unique
  • fig 21.2 Calle Jose Azueta 271
    Yeni Mao
    fig 21.2 Calle Jose Azueta 271, 2021
    Copper plated steel with wax finish
    44.5 x 29 x 56.2 cm
    17.5 x 11.5 x 5.5 in
    Unique
  • fig 23.5 sissy glyph
    Yeni Mao
    fig 23.5 sissy glyph, 2021
    Steel, gold-plated steel, acrylic enamel, cement
    41 x 28 x 3-1/2 in
    104 x 71 x 9cm
  • fig 25.7 i come apart
    Yeni Mao
    fig 25.7 i come apart, 2021
    Steel, plaster, ceramic, turquoise, leather, rubber, cotton cord, cow horn
    55 x 17 x 8 in
    140 x 43 x 20 cm
  • fig 25.9 headhunter
    Yeni Mao
    fig 25.9 headhunter, 2021
    Steel, galvanized pipe, embossed leather, hardware
    229 x 41 x 33 cm
    90 x 16 x 13 in
  • fig 26.2 kaaito
    Yeni Mao
    fig 26.2 kaaito, 2021
    Ceramic, graphite, steel
    22.9 x 43.2 x 31.8 cm
    9 x 17 x 12 1/2 in
  • fig 27.3 ghost
    Yeni Mao
    fig 27.3 ghost, 2021
    Ceramic, ceramic tiles, steel, acrylic enamel
    16 x 12 x 33 in
    41 x 31 x 84 cm
  • fig 31.1 rattle
    Yeni Mao
    fig 31.1 rattle, 2021
    Ceramic, painted steel
    186.7 x 58.4 x 30.5 cm
    73 1/2 x 23 x 12 in
  • fig 31.2 sling
    Yeni Mao
    fig 31.2 sling, 2021
    Blackened steel, leather, hardware
    236.2 x 44.5 x 96.5 cm
    93 x 17 1/2 x 38 in
  • fig 23.6 i am the brother of this snake
    Yeni Mao
    fig 23.6 i am the brother of this snake, 2020
    Steel, blue calcite, cement, henequin
    318 x 48 x 26 cm
    126 x 19 x 10 in
    Hang bar
    154 x 47 7 x 2.5 cm
    60.5 x 18.5 x 1 in
    Unique
  • fig 24.3 even those with no place heave in memory
    Yeni Mao
    fig 24.3 even those with no place heave in memory, 2020
    Ceramic, blackened and nickel plated steel, nickel plated volcanic rock, aluminum, acrylic enamel
    68 x 69 x 56 cm
    26 3/4 x 27 1/8 x 22 1/8 in
Press