For over 30 years, AUGUST MUTH (B. 1955 In Albuquerque, New Mexico) has been an artist who exhibits internationally and pioneers the exploration of light through holography. He developed an interest in light at age 16, when he crafted large water-filled glass prisms to refract prismatic light onto his family's garage door.
In 1973, he relocated to Aspen, Colorado to work as a jewelry maker, where he became captivated by the light of opals and diamonds. Upon his return to Albuquerque the following year, he enrolled in art and physics courses at the University of New Mexico. He later continued his studies at both the University of Houston and the University of Texas at Austin.
In 1978, Muth relocated to New York City to pursue his career as an artist. It was in 1980, at The Museum of Holography in Soho, that he began his exploration of holography under the mentorship of Fred Unterseher. He moved to the Telluride, Colorado area in 1985 to establish his first holographic studio.
Over the next seven years, he sharpened his skills using the Denisyuk single-beam holography technique. During this period, his interest in the relationship between light, space, and time grew significantly, necessitating studio expansion. In 1994, he reimagined and reconstructed his studio in Santa Fe, New Mexico. While in Santa Fe, he prioritized producing larger holograms and thus spent thousands of hours developing techniques to achieve this goal.
Trial and error played a significant role in his practice as nobody had ever produced large-scale single-beam holo-grams before. After a crucial breakthrough that led to the abandonment and complete transformation of previous techniques, he was able to produce even greater holograms.
Muth continues to create works that explore the relationship between light, space, and time in his studio located in Santa Fe, New Mexico.