| Mark Sharp leaves his remarkable acrylic paintings and works on paper untitled intentionally to give free rein to each viewer’s imagination and reading of his pieces. He doesn’t object to the audience finding figurative references in his abstract works. In fact, his studio practice oscillates between moving forward and moving backward, stylistically and within his color palette. Sharp’s early performances as a pianist and violinist are reflected in the emotionality and aggressiveness of his evolving works. Characteristically, all works contain bold shapes, often in black and frequently with enhanced color outlines, that serve as armatures within the works, like staves holding notes within a musical composition. Dictated by the speed with which acrylic paint dries, Sharp creates lines and planes of varying colors. |  |
Orchestrated Surfaces – Kóan Jeff Baysa
Mark Sharp leaves his remarkable acrylic paintings and works on paper untitled intentionally to give free rein to each viewer’s imagination and reading of his pieces. He doesn’t object to the audience finding figurative references in his abstract works. In fact, his studio practice oscillates between moving forward and moving backward, stylistically and within his color palette. Sharp’s early performances as a pianist and violinist are reflected in the emotionality and aggressiveness of his evolving works.
Characteristically, all works contain bold shapes, often in black and frequently with enhanced color outlines, that serve as armatures within the works, like staves holding notes within a musical composition. Dictated by the speed with which acrylic paint dries, Sharp creates lines and planes of varying colors. He accomplishes further surface treatments with paper towels, his own hands or rags, evincing the works’ palimpsestal nature.
In #171, the composition is dense and dynamic with emboldened marks and hues, invoking a landscape viewed as if refracted through a crystalline butterfly wing. In the newest work in the show, #192, the painting asymptotically approaches figuration accompanied by a palette shift to tans, ochres and light blues. Under the influence of jazz, blues or classical music, the artist painted patterns of rhomboid and concentric shapes of various colors in vibrant reaction to and relationship with one another.
Former MoMA curator Kirk Varnedoe said that more than "pure looking" was necessary to understand the language of abstract art that is both man-made, and with intention. Within the orchestrated surfaces and structures of these remarkable abstract paintings, the applied pigments channel the gestures and emotions of the artist and parallel the tensions and dynamics of a brilliant musical score.
