Artist’s Statement

"Mark Allison" © Mark Allison 2009 watercolor on paper

When I try to understand my primary motive in life and reduce it to a single word, that word is beauty. It is what turns my engine over and keeps it running. It is my food, water and air. It is my reason for getting up in the morning and dealing with the trouble that is amply supplied to every earthling. The reason I draw and paint is to increase my capacity to drink in beauty.

I love to teach drawing and painting because I believe an effective way to learn is to continually give away what you know. When that knowledge is used by another soul it comes back to you in a different and greatly expanded form, more beautiful, more individual, worth more. I also believe in saturation, not only living life as a constant observer of beauty but working and playing with life in a tangible way every day.

The right brain is used for seeing and dreaming new thoughts, feelings, shapes and colors. The logical/verbal left brain is used to critique the work and compare it to existing solutions and run it past the rules of design to see if our inner judge can accept it on those terms. Enjoying or reliving an experience of beauty whether it comes from a painting, music or a sunset, requires the cooperation and participation of both hemispheres. Contemplating beauty, in addition to being deeply satisfying, is conducive of wholeness.

Carl Jung thought works of art were “symbols of wholeness,” imparting health in the observer. We become what we contemplate. I see works of art as energy fields and doors or windows into a parallel universe. Art is a way to increase our awareness and consciousness.