Formally trained as a Fine Art painter in the early 90's Mark Harris followed his time at Art college also pursuing his passion for film and the moving image.
After self-training as a 3D artist and working for several years at UK games companies Mark went onto consolidate his skills and work as a compositor and VFX supervisor working across advertising, tv and film projects in the UK and Australia.
Mark's appreciation of film-making and fine art also gave birth to the popular FILM.ART collection of limited edition film-inspired prints which combines his skills in both crafts.
The series of large format Giclée prints represent select movie titles by sampling the palette of every individual frame of the film. The resulting works are abstract landscapes of colour swatches creating horizons that change in time with the mood and flow of the films that they depict.
The works are created in the same aspect ratio as the films were originally screened, linking the presentation of the prints directly back to their celluloid counterparts.
"The collection of my work on show here at Mr-Benn was born out of my earlier explorations in capturing moments of a particular process or place, such as the 1994 ink on canvas work 'Ice' which captures the melting of a naturally formed and found sheet of ice."
'Ice' oil on canvas 1994
"These explorations led me to investigate how others come to view and capture their surroundings. The idea of tourists photographing the same landmarks, from different viewpoints, at different times, led me to produce a set of work layering up hundreds of found images of landmarks, both man-made and natural. The resulting images, both ghostly and painterly evoke a new and unified sense of place and time as can be seen in this example of Ayers Rock (Uluru) from 2013".
'Uluru' ink on paper 2013
"My current work is an extension of these former explorations and again uses the layered results of hundreds of found images from which I find and develop my own new perspective of a place or object."