{"id":169642,"date":"2014-01-14T19:25:00","date_gmt":"2014-01-15T00:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/portfolio\/michael-merrill\/"},"modified":"2023-05-03T20:57:52","modified_gmt":"2023-05-04T01:57:52","slug":"michael-merrill","status":"publish","type":"portfolio","link":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/portfolios\/michael-merrill\/","title":{"rendered":"Michael Merrill"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>When working in construction, Michael Merrill loved the image of a skeletal frame and its ochre two-by-fours silhouetted against a blue sky, embodying the potential transformation taking place. This fulcrum of transformation is a central theme in his work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the mid 1990s, influenced by his work as an installer in museums and galleries, he began making paintings about art itself. The series <em>Paintings about Art<\/em> revolved around how objects become transfigured by their environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Commissioned in 2009 by the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Merrill installed twelve paintings of the museum\u2019s architecturally varied pavilions throughout the site to activate the transitional or \u201cdead\u201d spaces and create links between the various galleries. During this period, the museum was in the process of transforming a portion of the Erskine and American United Church into the Claire and Marc Bourgie Pavilion of Quebec and Canadian Art. The four paintings reproduced here are from the <em>Inner Space <\/em>series.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1359\" height=\"1920\" src=\"https:\/\/esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Scaffold-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-169641\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Scaffold-scaled.jpg 1359w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Scaffold-300x424.jpg 300w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Scaffold-600x848.jpg 600w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Scaffold-768x1085.jpg 768w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Scaffold-1087x1536.jpg 1087w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Scaffold-1450x2048.jpg 1450w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1359px) 100vw, 1359px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Michael merrill,<br><em>Scaffold<\/em> (claire and marc bourgie pavilion), 2010.<br>Photo : permission de l&#8217;artiste\u2009| courtesy of the artists<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1386\" height=\"1920\" src=\"https:\/\/esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_4th-Floor-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-169635\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_4th-Floor-scaled.jpg 1386w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_4th-Floor-300x416.jpg 300w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_4th-Floor-600x831.jpg 600w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_4th-Floor-768x1064.jpg 768w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_4th-Floor-1109x1536.jpg 1109w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_4th-Floor-1479x2048.jpg 1479w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1386px) 100vw, 1386px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Michael Merrill,<br><em>4<sup>th<\/sup> Floor <\/em>(claire and marc bourgie \u00adpavilion), 2011.<br>Photo : permission de l&#8217;artiste\u2009| courtesy of the artist<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignfull size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1386\" src=\"https:\/\/esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Ducts-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-169639\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Ducts-scaled.jpg 1920w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Ducts-300x217.jpg 300w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Ducts-600x433.jpg 600w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Ducts-768x554.jpg 768w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Ducts-1536x1109.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/80_PO01_Merill_Ducts-2048x1479.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Michael Merrill,<br><em>Ducts<\/em> (claire and marc bourgie pavilion), 2010.<br>Photo : permission de l&#8217;artiste\u2009| courtesy of the artist<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<div style='display: none;'>Michael Merrill<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1303,"featured_media":169637,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"categories":[281,885],"numeros":[3308],"disciplines":[],"statuts":[335],"checklist":[],"auteurs":[],"artistes":[3330],"thematiques":[],"type_portfolio":[],"class_list":["post-169642","portfolio","type-portfolio","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive","category-portfolio","numeros-80-renovation-en","statuts-archive","artistes-michael-merrill-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio\/169642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/portfolio"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/portfolio"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1303"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169642"},{"taxonomy":"numeros","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/numeros?post=169642"},{"taxonomy":"disciplines","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/disciplines?post=169642"},{"taxonomy":"statuts","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/statuts?post=169642"},{"taxonomy":"checklist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/checklist?post=169642"},{"taxonomy":"auteurs","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/auteurs?post=169642"},{"taxonomy":"artistes","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artistes?post=169642"},{"taxonomy":"thematiques","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/thematiques?post=169642"},{"taxonomy":"type_portfolio","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/type_portfolio?post=169642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}