This mural depicts a young girl reaching toward a group of chickens. She might be feeding them or trying to touch them. They are aware of her but, like chickens, are going about their own business. There are two worlds—the human world and the chicken world—and in the mural there is some kind of connection between them. The imagery comes from a photo shoot by Horst in an Albuquerque back yard.

One of the beautiful things about Albuquerque is that the natural world is almost always visible in the form of the mountains, the volcanos, the mesa, the Bosque. The presence of farm animals in the city is another way this other world intrudes. Maybe the mural invites some kind of relationship to this natural world, or maybe it just celebrates this beautiful aspect of our city.

Mark Horst lives and works in Albuquerque, New Mexico, working in portraiture, murals and sculpture. His public art projects often include a significant level of community engagement. Horst carries a quiver full of painterly gifts. His startling work reveals wild pinpricks of the eternal, often in the subtlest of images. Make no mistake, the paintings sometimes hold our feet to the flame - a door between a collectively understood image and some new paint-spirit that comes hurtling through. It is not always a comfortable experience. That door is also a gateway between the tacit and the explicit - his sheer feel and technique is obvious, but there are other energies at work here too, some ancient condition of the soul. Horst is one of the few new painters to hold the paradox of tradition and innovation within him. There is brilliance here.

Supported By
City of Albuquerque 1% for Art, HB Construction