Steve Martin, Ann Philbin to curate new Santa Barbara Museum of Art exhibit of 'peculiar' paintings

Martin Mull was champion known to audiences for playing comedic characters similar Col. Mustard successful “Clue” and Gene Parmesan successful “Arrested Development,” but a caller grounds opening adjacent twelvemonth astatine the Santa Barbara Museum of Art seeks to elevate the relation Mull was astir arrogant to inhabit: a respected painter.

“Martin Mull: The Joys of Indoor/Outdoor Living,” co-curated by comedian Steve Martin and Hammer Museum Director Emerita Ann Philbin, comes to SBMA adjacent June and runs done October. It volition beryllium the archetypal large depository accumulation of Mull’s artwork successful 20 years.

The paintings featured see scenes of unassuming houses visited by otherworldly guests, dead-eyed bureau workers, gravity-defying displays and lambs being led to the slaughter. They play with perspective, color, abstraction and clip to illuminate postwar American tensions, beryllium they racial, governmental oregon existential.

“Martin Mull’s enactment arsenic an creator volition surely beryllium his superior legacy,” Martin said successful a statement. “After a full-time vocation successful painting, successful the past 20 years of his beingness with his method gifts afloat developed, Martin’s creation coalesced into tight, communicative paintings of a peculiar nature. Combining surreal elements with household idioms, helium formed his ain disquieted portrayal of American life.”

Martin Mull’s “Band connected the Run,” 2014. Oil connected panel.

(Estate of Martin Mull)

The exhibit, which volition instrumentality implicit the museum’s 6,000 quadrate feet of main galleries, volition diagnostic much than 50 paintings and drawings by Mull, astir of which travel from the artist’s property and the backstage collections of Mull’s amusement manufacture colleagues, including Steve Martin, Jennifer Tilly, and Ted and Nicole Sarandos .

The grounds is the 2nd curatorial collaboration betwixt Martin and Philbin since 2015, erstwhile they partnered connected “The Idea of North: The Paintings of Lawren Harris” astatine the Hammer Museum.

Steve Martin and Ann Philbin — astatine the Hammer Museum gala successful 2005 — person been friends and collaborators for years.

(John Shearer / WireImage )

Philbin, who retired from her longtime relation arsenic the Hammer’s manager successful 2024, told The Times via email that the thought down the Mull amusement came aft she saw 1 of his paintings successful Martin’s eating room.

“Steve talked astir however Mull’s coating signifier was his deepest passion, contempt the information that his fame was arsenic an histrion and comedian. It prompted maine to bash a small research, and I became precise intrigued by his assemblage of work. I wrote to Steve, ‘Martin Mull. There’s thing there.’ That’s however the task began,” she said.

Along with Martin and Philbin, the upcoming accumulation is led by SBMA Chief Curator James Glisson and Amada Cruz, the museum’s manager and CEO. In a quality release, a depository spokesperson said Mull’s enactment “upsets immoderate storybook representation of perfection” and resists nostalgia portion acknowledging its allure.

Martin Mull’s “Envy,” 2008, from the bid “Seven Deadly Sins.” Oil connected linen.

(Estate of Martin Mull)

“It’s truthful profoundly unusual — acheronian and funny, hopeful and menacing each astatine once,” Philbin said. “The paintings are astir the smoldering tensions that underlie the American dream, truthful I deliberation it’s a peculiarly apt infinitesimal to bring them backmost into the nationalist eye.”

Mull, who died successful 2024, received his maestro of good arts grade successful coating from the Rhode Island School of Design successful 1967. Though helium went connected to trade a vocation successful the nationalist oculus arsenic a musician, comedian and actor, coating remained his “true vocation.”

Martin, a longtime person of the multidisciplinary artist, echoed this sentiment successful an email to The Times.

“If a comedian says helium is besides a painter, run. Except this once.”