Up in the Air


michael-mullaney-south-boston-artist-transit

Transit, 30-by-22-inch mixed media on paper, 617-269-0424, michaelmullaney.com.

Michael Mullaney’s South Boston studio is brimming with found objects, torn drawings, old book pages, craft supplies, and magazine clippings, and he’s not afraid to use any of them in his work. “I enjoy diving into the pile and finding something that will trigger a tug of war with materials,” the mixed-media artist (and MassArt grad) says. Mullaney created this textural piece, for example—inspired by the changing topography observed from an airplane window—by layering rock salt, acrylic paint, and aluminum foil, then strategically stripping away sections to reveal the stratification of materials beneath. The addition of printed type was meant to evoke street signs or road markers: “sometimes instructive, at other times puzzling,” he says.