M A R K T R A C Y

MARK TRACY

My work finds momentum in the use of enigma, humor, and a play in the collocation of images towards a final image, the painted surface. In an attempt to understand the meaning of the image, I began to test visual, symbolic, and metaphoric signs and placing them in relational absurdities, looking for a coherence in the disconnection and cognitive dissonance experienced. When done correctly, the painted surface sets forth its own language, decipherable and intuitively reasoned and can contain an arresting quality, one that has potential to unlock meta-beliefs and understandings, one that is self revealing, and one that can create additional interests with new meanings and hoped-for new passions. Our lives are layers of experiences, one emotion on top of the other. Many times we are unsure which layer of experience will surface to the visible and become the known, all the while defining our own self image. My effort in painting is thus in execution: one layer upon layer towards a semblance of what I see as the life experience. The painted image is life painted.

Education/studies/Experience:

First and foremost: I consider myself self taught, even though my entire life has been immersed in Art, due to my Art focused upbringing.

Education: 2000 - 2001 Pratt Art Institute

Studied under the tutelage of Richart (my father): a professional Artist and Art teacher.

Various private instruction in music and Art.

ARTISTIC PHILOSOPHY: I find basis for my efforts in reason and the template of Western thinking is my truth serum for real discovery in the creative experience.
The work that you see before you is such, that it offers you to bring something of yourself to the viewing table. My work is interested in the meaning of symbol, metaphor, color, and emotional reaction. My work is not a vacuum of interests, but rather a singular step with the collective in mind, not in the creative process of the work mind you, but a substance that I consider in the motivation of my work.