Among the themes and ideas utilized by Plug In ICA to create a contemporary art program that is vital to Winnipeg audiences is to reconnect artists who have established their careers elsewhere back to the community that nurtured them. One such artist is MARK KARASICK, currently working in London, England, but born and raised in Winnipeg. Mark’s complex, often large-scale paintings are gathering international notice with exhibitions in Europe, Asia and the U.S. This is his first major exhibition in Winnipeg.
Mark’s work is partially an inquiry into the consequences of technological representation. He marries image capture in digital process with a profound and painterly treatment of the face – impactful not only from the expression and character, but by the very scale and accomplishment of the painting process he enlists. The painting technique he employs is particularly complex involving many layers of wax and pigment on canvas, each painting subtly built up with colour and texture. His recent work incorporates dialectic between video and painting, the digital and analog, real time and memory.
Mark Karasick received an A.O.C.A. from the Ontario College of Art in Toronto, in 1983 and a B.A. from Guelph University in 1984 during which time he also studied anatomy and physiology with a view to medical illustration. Since then he has exhibited his works in solo and group exhibitions in North America and Europe. He has also been a visiting critic and lecturer at universities, art colleges and art galleries in Canada, Italy, Holland and England.
He left Winnipeg in 1979 to attend the Ontario College of Art. It was at Guelph University in 1983 that he met Tony Scherman, who introduced him to encaustic painting. He initially intended to work with it as a means to break precedent and to further develop his personal syntax and practice.
In 1989 he traveled to Italy with the intention of staying for 6 months and met the renowned Swiss-Italian Collector Signor Carlo Monzino who invited him to stay for 5 years while collecting his work. Since that time he has lived and worked in Paris for 4 years and has been living and working in London since 1998.
Meet Mark Karasick at the opening reception, Friday 26 November, 8 pm at Plug In ICA.
Mark Karasick is represented in Canada by the Christopher Cutts Gallery, Toronto.
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