Artscape

Words of encouragement

By Tracy Zollinger Turner

WILL SHILLING PHOTO

About 10 years ago, Matt Mascaro shared a Brooklyn apartment with a friend who regularly put handwritten signs up on the bathroom mirror. Words like "you have enough" or "you are beautiful" accompanied the daily, mundane tasks of tooth brushing and shaving—the grooming moments when most of us are at our most self-critical.

"He put these affirmations in the mirror, so that he could, first thing in the morning every day, start to change the way he thought about himself," said Mascaro.

Four years sober, the friend hoped that the messages might also give Mascaro, who had been spinning through a period of substance abuse and performance art, a nudge toward sobriety.

They did. He saved the originals, which are currently hanging in his East Hollywood, California, bungalow. They helped inspire Objectification—his installation of video portraits, some of which are faintly masked with phrases like "I am free," "Love you," and "I am complete."

Together, the words and images are an autobiographical triptych, told through the expressions and character lines on the faces of many who have born some influence on him. The installation makes its Columbus debut during Gallery Hop at Elements of Art.

"I started shooting only people who were really close to me—family, good friends, ex-girlfriends, artists that I knew," he said. "The camera lens was the mirror, and the words that I put on the screen—if I were the mirror, what would I say to that person."

One of the faces belongs to photographer Ken Ohara, whose 1970 book of black and white photographs, One, includes hundreds of tightly shot faces. His work bears a clear aesthetic and spiritual influence on Mascaro's video portraits.

"I deliberately hand-hold the camera the whole time I'm shooting people—I want the viewer to see the tremor in my hand," he said. "You realize that there's a connection between the person being photographed and the person on the other side."

He has also created some mini-documentaries, including one with beat poet and Andy Warhol film star Taylor Meade. Another features Debbie Doebereiner, the star of Steven Soderbergh's industry-challenging Bubble, who will be making an appearance to speak at Mascaro's installation at 6 p.m. Saturday.

Mascaro, who spent most of his school years in Worthington, has explored more than a few avenues of fine art and pop culture, including Fimo jewelry making, punk rock music and low-budget filmmaking. Many of his successes have been accidental.

In the nine years that he's called Los Angeles home, he has made the majority of his living in the culinary arts, a skill for which he has no formal training, but plenty of passion.

In 2000, he applied to a domestic agency for the super-wealthy, trying to pass himself off as an established chef to the stars. They called his bluff, but were charmed enough to send him to Rachel Hunter's house to make Thanksgiving dinner. He soon began to regularly chef for Rod Stewart, Sharon Stone, Quentin Tarantino and the Arquette family, among others.

Spending a year working to develop a television show that never saw the light of day (a connection made through celebrity catering) finally brought him to fine art photography.

"I was so fried from that experience, I sat and I thought to myself: I'm not going to do anything else to sell," he said. "I'm going to fill my house with artwork, and only do art that is for me. If it's on my wall and I like it that's got to be enough."

He bought a camera and began to shoot roll after roll of people in his neighborhood, like B-movie stars and Michael, a deaf transvestite prostitute who is also featured in Objectification.

Not long ago, his worlds briefly collided when Patricia Arquette called to book his chef services while he was shooting Michael at his home. Neither of his worlds was made aware of the other.

"I have a weird passport that allows me on the street and in these huge mansions," he said. "It's a pretty charmed life."

April 5th, 2007

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