Born and Raised in New York City, Pierre Merkl III was born into a family with long roots in lower Manhattan, Long Island City and Albany, New York. He is the oldest child, with six sisters. His father worked at five and dime stores in Brooklyn and Manhattan, and Pierre worked summers at his dad’s store on Broadway in Spanish Harlem. During college, he ran a bookstore in Greenwich Village and lived off in the woods of New England and Nova Scotia, to contrast civilization with none. He graduated to Alphabet City in the East Village: while Scorcese was filming Taxi Driver on Second Avenue, Pierre was driving a Checker on Avenue B.
Feeling the Spirit of ‘76--Pierre drove across the United States, stopping at skid row bookstores to buy old paperbacks, and landing in Las Vegas with a trunk full of pulp. His first year in San Francisco, he took a room at a flop a block from the Lefty O’Doul Bridge. South of da’ Slot (now ‘SOMA’) was the perfect place to pursue action and aesthetic adventure.
Dedicated to figure drawing full-time for years, he began painting billboards and signs for a living. Tired of fighting heights, he ‘fell into’ into the detective business for support. He pursued his art in studio and from life, evolving a unique and intriguing style of conceptual figurative painting.
The poetry into a multi-media performance act, and evolved into the Mr. Lucky persona. As a young crooner in the era of disco and punk, he gained considerable notoriety, appearing at many California and New York venues, including panelist and performer at Lincoln Center in New York and bringing memorable musical events for several years to Center Camp at Burning Man in Nevada.
Forever favoring sharkskin suits, driving a 1961 New Yorker and quick with the wisecrack, Mr. Lucky’s style of flashy substance gathers popularity when and wherever he and his work appears. While enjoying the party, Pierre Merkl’s visual art takes deep center stage,striving, ‘driven to vision….’ |