CH

Yeah... How has being a dad influenced your approach to making?

MM

It's certainly given me more constraints around my time to make. It's made me lighter. I don't think I'm too serious about making in any particular way anymore. I have less expectations of it being something, and I just try to enjoy the ride.

Because at home there's our kid, you know? At the end of the day, we made him. So that's pretty satisfying. It took off any layer of cool I still had in my head about myself. It made me feel like that didn't matter in the slightest anymore.

CH

Exactly. I remember reading an interview with Louise Bonnet, and her saying, "once you're a parent, the mask is off" and really connecting with that.

MM

Yeah, totally.
The only person that I want to think I'm cool now is our son.
And you.

CH

Well, I think you’re the coolest.

What's your favorite thing about being a dad so far?

MM

There's a lot, but it's probably making him laugh.

CH

Yeah.

MM

I want to be really good at making him laugh.

CH

You are.

What is one thing you learned from your dad?

MM

Hmm... My dad is the one who taught me to be lighthearted. He was pretty silly most of the time, and really friendly with everybody around him. That was cool. I saw that a lot.

CH

What's one thing you want our son to learn from you?

MM

Probably the same thing. Not taking yourself too seriously helps make real struggle in life bearable.

CH

Mm-hmm

MM

You can always find humor in something. The second you get too serious is when it all feels heavy.

CH

I feel like your works are a visual manifestation of that... finding lightheartedness in the struggle. Your titles and little notes are always quirky and funny, but with your mark making, sometimes there is a struggle, like in your piece "Ape Shit". You sense this turmoil almost.

MM

Yeah. I mean, the notes and words help take the seriousness out of it.

CH

Out of making the work?

MM

Yeah or just showing up to make it.

They alleviate this feeling like I'm attempting to be, I don't know... mysterious or what's a good word for it? Dramatic or something. Also, the artists that I looked up to and studied in school had a sort of silliness, you know... They had a lightness to their work.

CH

Who were some of those artists?

MM

Definitely all of my printmaking teachers in school. My teacher Wayne Klein ran this amazing print shop in Atlanta called Rolling Stone Press and he introduced me to so much. The work of Will Walmsley, aka "The Ding Dong Daddy". His work was the first time I saw something that I found visually beautiful AND funny.

Artists like Cy Twombly, Morris Louis, Richard Serra and Ellsworth Kelly left a big impression.

There was this domino effect of being introduced to that work young and my school being connected to a museum, where I just had access to see those works every day. A Warhol... or whatever I wanted to see... a Lichtenstein, a Rauschenberg, a Jasper Johns. All those things were so much a part of my daily life when I was in school that I couldn't help but have them seep in.

But, I really fell in love with printmaking because of Will Walmsley's work. He called himself "The Ding Dong Daddy" and he drew dicks on everything. It was incredible, and free. They were nine color, day glow lithographs done with this beautiful technique and control. They looked insane.

CH

Yeah

MM

He's sort of an unknown one too. It's cool to share him with other artists and they're like, who? And then, when we went to Gemini-Gel the other night and I asked a fellow printmaker if they know who Will Walmsley is and it's like...of course!

CH

Totally. That's what I think is so amazing about being a part of the printmaking community. John Greco is one of those people.

MM

Oh my God. Yeah, for sure. John.

CH

You can say a name and someone knows who they are. How often does that happen anymore?

MM

Not very often.

John gives me such a similar feeling to the teachers I had in art school. The depth of knowledge and experience that he has... and expertise... and then he's just this kind-hearted, wonderful guy. There's a lot of excitement happening in his space (Josephine Press) and there's a lot of fun in his work. I look around his studio and I just think he's so excellent. He's a more recent influence, you know, here in the last decade, but yeah, LOVE John.

CH

Okay. So I think this is a cool place to go from here...
Favorite art you've seen this year?

MM

It's gonna be pretty hard to beat just going into the back print shop at Gemini GEL the other night. Seeing the Richard Serra proofs on the wall, talking with Xavier (who has been making Richard Serra prints for 25 years) about making them and seeing the plates, the buckets of oil sticks… THAT was really unexpected.

If it was a show in the past year... Who was the artist that did all the amazing color and light work in Palm Springs?

CH

Phillip K Smith III.

MM

Yeah. That work blew me away. That room where the walls all changed colors! I think that was some of the most futuristic work that I'd ever seen.

CH

Impactful

MM

Like really perfect. Such precision and such an overall control of the room and space.

CH

Least favorite art you've seen this year?

MM

Oh man. Least favorite art I've seen this year? [laugh]. That's a good question. [laugh]. Wow.

Least favorite!?

I don't want to say.

CH

I love that answer.

MM

Can we go back to the best art that I saw this year? Maybe it was John Waters’ personal collection at the Baltimore Museum of Art. That was incredible.

CH

I loved that he referred to the works in his collection as his “roommates”.

Okay. If you had a magic power, what would it be?

MM

Wow. Magic power. I don't wanna choose something that's super easy, like, you know, flying. [laugh].

CH

I don't know. Teleporting would be cool.

MM

Teleporting is pretty sick. But like, is it only me that gets to teleport or could I touch you and bring you with me? Cause if that's the case, well...

CH

I love that you're really giving it a good go.

MM

Yeah, I'm trying...

It'd be pretty cool to talk to animals.

CH

You know, that is SO you.

MM

Yeah. So it's either teleportation or talking to animals.

CH

HA! If you were an animal, what would you be?

MM

Our dog. Because he doesn't do anything but eat, sleep and play. [laugh].

CH

He does live the good life.

What are you listening to right now in the studio? I love this question bc I really don’t know and I used to know when we would work together more, but now with the baby...

MM

Yeah. Well I used to have to make sure it was okay for you to listen to.

CH

Exactly. I know you listen to some shit in the studio. Like, some crazy stuff.

MM

I definitely listen to heavier music when you're not around, but I also have a soft spot for girl bands right now. It's kind of embarrassing.

CH

That's sweet.

MM

You know I love girl bands.

CH

Name your three favorite girl bands right now.

MM

Pretty Sick, boygenius, and Wet Leg.

CH

How do you prepare for a print day? Like one that you really want to make some stuff happen?

MM

The only way I can make stuff happen is to have all the other shit that I have to do out of the way first. Then I have free space in my head.

CH

That would be Rick Rubin’s advice.

MM

Then being in the studio feels way more natural and you're not preoccupied with other tasks that you have to do.

CH

Mm-hmm.

MM

Otherwise, I don't really prepare that much. I mean, unless you call taping up screens and like tearing paper and all that stuff part of it.I try not to be too planned past what you already have to do to make a print. It's quite a bit.

Do you think this is how most interviews go?

CH

I don't really know. It's nice though.

MM

Probably the same thing. Not taking yourself too seriously helps make real struggle in life bearable.

CH

I don't really know. It's nice though.

MM

It is nice. I appreciate you doing it.

CH

So what's with all the black and white?

MM

Oh. I have been there for a really long time and I think printmaking just looks really great in black and white. I love the contrast of a black print on a piece of paper and how that just feels natural. Like a newspaper. Black ink has always lived on them.

It's the starting place I guess. It’s foundational.

CH

One time you described something to me about when you see something in black and white you can really determine if it's sound.

MM

Yeah. Well and they teach you that, right? Like when you're designing a logo or something. If it doesn't work in black and white, then it's not going to work in color.

CH

Yeah.

MM

It's just foundational. I could make a million black and white pieces. I'm never gonna get tired of the way that looks. I also don't want it to be like, oh, it's red - he's angry. Oh, it's blue - he's sad. You know? It takes away this thing where someone else assigns a feeling to it because of a color.

It forces you to look at the image rather than think about how maybe you don't like the color orange. You kind of have to judge it at this rudimentary level when it's black and white.

CH

Favorite way to end the studio day or typical way to end the studio day?

MM

Clean up lots of stuff. Clean up lots of black ink. Hopefully there's a cold beer in our mini fridge.

CH

I was gonna ask you your least favorite thing about printmaking, but I think I already know.

MM

Do you think you know? Do you wanna answer it for me? [laugh] I want to hear your answer and I'll tell you if it's right.[laugh]

CH

It was cleaning up.

MM

Oh no, no. Cleaning up is fine. My least favorite thing about printmaking is a clogged screen. Like when you just started printing and then the print just closes up. You're like, shit, I just did all this prep work and I poured all this ink into the screen and now I can't even use it. That's the worst. And then you have to clean it up [laugh]

CH

That is the worst.

MM

Screen printing. So simple and yet so complicated. Actually. I think that's all printing. [laugh]

CH

What is your first memory of printmaking?

MM

I was 15 or so, probably 96'. I went to a trophy shop down the street from my high school and brought them these designs or logos that I had drawn out in a notebook. I guess I knew that they did stuff for our school, the basketball jerseys or something like that. I saw their shop and thought, oh, that's how you make t-shirts. That's how you do screen printing. I was obsessed.

CH

And then you worked somewhere right?

MM

I worked at a print shop during art school.

CH

That's right.

MM

I took a semester off of school and worked in the screen printing shop when I couldn't afford tuition.

CH

That was like your exchange program.

MM

Yeah. They let me print my own stuff after hours and they would leave me the keys.

CH

That's so cool.

MM

Yeah, it was cool.
It definitely made me fall in love even more with printing.

CH

It was like an additional semester at school, not taking a semester off.

MM

Yeah. Cause I was still making my own thing. But I spent all day long in a warehouse in hot, muggy Atlanta summer. Cleaning screens, reclaiming them, coating them, drying them, spraying them out. That's all I did all day.
You'd have to coat your arms with this stuff so that all the skin and hair on your arms wouldn't get burned off. Back then it was still tons of crazy chemicals and solvents.

CH

Mm-hmm.

MM

It was kind of a gnarly job.

CH

Okay. I'm gonna end on this one.

MM

Okay.

CH

What freaks you out?

MM

[laugh]. Oh man.

I think it freaks me out that one day our kid is just gonna go off and live this whole life where we're not around anymore. Because that's what we did to our parents. And I know it's gonna happen and I think it freaks me out because I get it now. It's so nice being near your kid. I love him. It's just one of those things. At some point you lose the ability to influence your kid and then they just become themselves.

It doesn't freak me out fully, but it freaks me out a little bit. [laugh]

CH

That is so true.

MM

[laugh] Thanks for interviewing me, honey.

CH

You're welcome. I love you so much.

MM

I love you too.

END.