Modern West is excited to exhibit works by Mike Whiting in the solo exhibition No Brakes, on view through August 31, 2022. No Brakes features Mike Whiting’s car hoods, fabricated steel wall hangings, and a miniature city of cars and buildings inspired by retro pixel-based video games. Hoods from a 1987 BMW 325i, 1967 Camaro, 1983 Volvo 240, and 1974 Porsche 914 feature racing stripes and nostalgic patterning applied in bright automotive paint. Scaled fabricated steel wall hangings also reflect vintage gaming and structured forms. The miniature city of sculptural works, also welded from fabricated steel, is composed of a box truck, micro bus, delivery truck, buildings, and a “big rig”. On the feature wall, Car Demon and Signal hanging sculptures allow the gallery-goer to feel part of the commotion and simplicity of Mike Whiting’s three-dimension rendered city. Red, yellow, green — go!

Constructed from welded steel and colored with bright automotive enamels, artist Mike Whiting creates playful sculptures drawing from the forms and imagery of early video gaming and computer graphics. Recognizing the extreme spareness of forms inherent to the constraints of pixel-based technologies Whiting states, “video gaming and minimalism arrived at the same visual conclusion through different means and by opposite intentions.” Whiting likewise attempts to communicate as much visual information as possible with his essential forms that combine the reductive simplicity of the minimalist movement and the sensibility of pop art in re-contextualizing cultural icons.