Las Manos Gallery is currently exhibiting the recent Op Art works of Mark Pease, a painter, printmaker, photographer, and animator. Mark is also a teacher at the University of Southern Illinois. The show is called ‘Climb into Space’ and runs until the end of November 2013.
If you want to find out more about the show, you can do so on the Las Manos Gallery blog, where you can also see some fascinating photos of Mark at work in his studio.
“My work is focused on perception, vision and how we process visual material as we travel through our surrounding urban and suburban environments. I start with a fascination for the architecture of shopping malls, commercial offices, modernist buildings and public transportation. I’m interested in the observation of these places and non-places and other visual experiences as they relate to human daydreaming, artificiality and the recognition of our visual sensitivities. I also draw from a variety of sources for inspiration including Op art, children’s toys and 3D animation. The integration of digital imaging, vector graphics, modeling and animation allow me to reconstruct scenarios regarding these observed spaces. Investigating through several media in projects that are both abstract and representational, I explore the line between dazzling and lackluster, flat and dimensional, object versus image, print versus painting, and mass produced object versus high art object. I’m attempting to create physical experiences in much of what I do; either through optical energies that force the eye to manage contradictory illusions or through the re-focusing of light, shadow and space in a way that the viewer is able to empathise and attach themselves to inanimate objects, architectural elements, and man-made surfaces.”
