Next to Nothing is proud to present Aberrant Ad Libs, an exhibition of paintings by Bridget Mullen and Daisy Parris. Painted in a style that initially presents the artwork as abstract before belying its more figurative nature, Mullen and Parris’ bodies of work are defined with a visual vocabulary that expresses concepts such as the unusual, violence, and struggles of the psyche. With a palette of colors ranging from dark tone and solid blacks, to soft browns, crisp yellows, pink fleshy tones and blue-greens, the paintings are layered with thick and thin brushstrokes, alternating between the exposed canvas or linen and the heavy concealment of it.

Produced in large scale, the works on view in Aberrant Ad Libs are based on specific motifs of the unsettling and discomforting, visualized through repetitive motion and random neurotic improvisation. Mullen paints by repetition of figures, warping them into strange abstractions, as seen in A Thought Is Dynamite, a bewitching painting of long slim legs curled around broomsticks; the slick blackness of the brooms is hypnotic and hair-raising. Parris’ paintings, on the other hand, are more obviously visceral and violent; we can see that she has rubbed the paint onto the canvas with force. Empty rooms are pulled into the center of gravity of lone boulders surreally floating in the center, as seen in The Weight On My Chest. Contextualizing the artwork with short, thoughtful phrases in either the titles or the paintings, both Mullen and Parris have chosen to give gravitas to the emotionality of their pieces, and though reveling in the desolate and grotesque, the paintings are far from being unpleasant.

Bridget Mullen holds an MFA from Massachusetts College of Art and a BAE from Drake University. She has attended residencies at The Jan Van Eyck Academie, The Lighthouse Works, Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Roswell Artist-In-Residence Program, The Fine Arts Work Center, VCCA, and Yaddo. Mullen has participated in group shows at DC Moore Gallery, NY; Thierry Goldberg, NY; Kopeikin Gallery, L.A.; L21, Mallorca, Spain; Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam, NL; and has had solo shows at Annet Gelink Gallery in Amsterdam, NL and Satellite Contemporary in Las Vegas, NV among others. She was a 2017-2018 recipient of a studio from the Sharpe-Walentas Studio Program in Brooklyn, NY. Mullen was born in Winona, Minnesota and lives and works in Brooklyn, NY.

Daisy Parris was born in Kent, England,1993. She graduated from Goldsmiths in 2014 and went onto do a residency at the HFBK in Hamburg. Her work has been exhibited in London, Germany, America and Sweden and she has recently had solo shows at The Chopping Block Gallery in London and Las Palmas Project in Lisbon. She currently lives and works in South London.