Making Refuge Exhibition
About the Exhibition
Can trash be beautiful?
Making Refuge is an ongoing performance in which artist Larry Burns, under the art persona of Mylar, makes the most out of trash, turning discarded materials into creative sculptures that engage with the natural environment and ask questions about the sustainability of modern practices of production and consumption. Catch Burns creatively at work on the MVC campus from November 2024 through March 2025.
Trash. Art. Creative Renewal.
Exhibitions will be held in two locations: the Edmund C. Jaeger Desert Institute behind the Student Academic Services Buildings, and in the Humanities Building on the first floor.
Refer to the performance schedule to view the artist at work, or stop by the installations any time to see the progress.
Once you've toured the exhibitions, please fill out our sustainability survey.
View the Art
What's in a name?
Mylar Explains His Interactive Exhibit
This absurd, interactive exhibit provides refuge to our shared playful, mammalion nature and sense of child-like wonder as we face an uncertain future. Join the creative process today by:
- Explore the many sculptures, named and numbered on mini chalkboards.
- Ask, "What does this cause me to think about or feel?"
- Write your own "caption" — cross out the current title and add yours with the chalk provided.
About the Artist
Mylar (aka Larry Burns) creates interactive assemblages from found objects, designed to reduce, reuse, and recycle the materials that cultural practices and social norms systemically fabricate. In 2019, he created Trash Novel, an absurdist novella crafted from cardboard, ChatGPT-2 outputs, and a manual typewriter. In 2022, he curated and maintained Cathy Allen’s Sunvale Village near Joshua Tree. In 2023, his multi-site project Making Refuge received a year-long grant from the California Arts Council.
He is now excited to develop new interactive sculptures for Making Refuge at MVC.
What do you think?
