mark

I have always tried to do what I felt was right at the time… or fun or exciting… whatever… and by some strange twisted chain of events fueled by bad decisions and questionable luck I ended up in Tucson… hard to have foreseen…
Perhaps Tucson provides the sense of oblivion and final escape that I was secretly searching for all along… maybe it doesn’t matter. I’ve lived in a lot of places and done a lot of different things... and so far I have few serious regrets (yes, there are a few).
Prior to my move to Tucson I drifted between Chicago, LA and New York while concentrating on my art work, friends and the scene in general... Since arriving in Tucson I’ve been focusing my artistic energies on photography and writing. I have produced a substantial body of new work collectively contained under an umbrella project I call “Beautiful Pointless Universe.” I have also written a number of philosophical novels that I am currently promoting for publication.
As an abbreviated introduction and bio:
I first studied photography at the College of Art and Design in Detroit before transferring to The School of The Art Institute, Chicago. After focusing exclusively on photography for several years I shifted my artistic efforts into the field of emotional expressionistic painting. After finishing at the Art Institute I began exhibiting my paintings in Chicago and was represented by the Peter Miller Gallery.
Then, in one rash drunken moment, and with no planning, I bought a one-way ticket to Berlin; packing my painting supplies and a small range finder camera into a backpack and climbing onto a People’s Express plane I set off to explore the darker side of Berlin and as much of Eastern and Western Europe as I could.
Later, after “losing” several months in Amsterdam I came to the realization that no matter how comfortable I felt in Europe that more opportunities existed for me back in the States. I returned to the USA and bought a beat International Harvester Scout and headed out on the road; settling in Los Angeles more than a year later.
While initially continuing to produce paintings in LA and showing them in local galleries, I found myself branching off again as I began exploring the creative and commercial possibilities of large scale constructivist sculpture, a medium in which I began receiving commissions from such clients as Barneys NY and select private collectors. At this same time I also started a freelance artistic services and creative finishing business that catered to architects, interior designers and furniture designers. After realizing a fair amount of success in this endeavor, the “rat race” aspects of running a competitive business in LA took its toll and I felt I had to get out... so I began looking for a different sort of challenge.
After a few minutes consideration I made the snap decision to go back to college for a fourth time and study philosophy and science under the guise of an engineering degree. I ended up graduating number one in my class with full honors and while a graduate student began work in the fields of artificial intelligence, control theory and structural dynamics which lead me to a research position at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.
Aside from being a visual and photographic artist as well as an active writer, I currently hold a “day job” as an engineer working in the field of advanced structural analysis and research.
Photographically I make no attempt to provide reassurances in my images, but explore the beauty in the pointless and haphazard universe around us. Our only special place in this universe is that of being conscious observers living within the flawed framework of our thoughts and emotions; in my writings I explore the aspects of this flawed human framework .