SHORT BIOGRAPHY
Mark Barnett (born in Cambridge, England, in 1995) is an artist. He completed a Diploma certificate (BTEC) in Art and Design at Long Road Sixth Form College in 2014. Four years later, he graduated from the University of Edinburgh, College of Art (ECA), with a Bachelor’s degree (with Honours) in Fine Art (Painting) in 2018. Sometime later, he extensively travelled, and graduated with a Master’s degree in Philosophy from the University of Essex in 2022. Now located in Scotland with an artist studio, he continues to be an artist.
ARTIST’S STATEMENT
I deem myself to be, first and foremost, an artist. In more technically precise terms, I would refer to myself as a contemporary abstract minimal painter (I also consider myself as a writer). My mixed-media artwork is an instinctual process — one that affirms physical materiality — and focuses on the pure expressionistic gestural impetus of different mediums.
Individuals who view minimal abstract expressionistic art often struggle to understand how to make sense of this art; however, I believe this art is perhaps better comprehended as a kind of visual language or as a sensuous perceptual experience. In this manner, I also see this art as playing a role in disclosing our complex capacity to be receptive to sensualities. Moreover, I draw from modern and contemporary art history in order to explore expressive form, mark-making, and composition in my work. Likewise, I strive to encapsulate emotions unobstructed by the historic conventions of landscape or figurative representation.
My artwork is equally influenced by a substantial theoretical interest in a diverse array of academic disciplines and poetical themes. On the one hand, in philosophy and theory, more specifically, these topics include: metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics, existentialism, phenomenology, Marxism, psychotherapy, critical theory, environmentalism, social justice, and literary criticism only to name a few. On the other hand, I seek to instil in my artwork sensuous emotive feelings, and a mysterious and poetical sense of the unknown. These diversely eclectic constituents thus circulate in my artwork.
Furthermore, I propose that one of art’s purposes, in general, is to articulate the uniquely discrete and lived experiences of the individual. In many cases, artists are emphatically dedicated to the systematic and rigorous interrogation of their own experiential sensualities. They may achieve this artistic self-expression by the use of whatever mediums, and or disciplines, they feel is necessary to do so. The exactitude of the creative process usually entails cultivating an indeterminacy that obscures how an artistic work will eventuate. I think of my own artwork as eliciting a series of complex thoughts and feelings, with no necessarily singular narrative, whilst imbued with emotion and immanent life.
REPRESENTATIVES
Amber Arts Ltd, Edinburgh, Scotland, from 2018 to 2020.
QUALIFICATIONS
BTEC (Level 3) Extended Diploma in Art and Design at Long Road Sixth Form College, Cambridge, England, from 2013 to 2014.
B.A. (with Honours) in Fine Art (Painting) at the University of Edinburgh, College of Art (ECA), Edinburgh, Scotland, from 2014 to 2018.
M.A. in Philosophy (Continental Philosophy) at the University of Essex, Colchester, England, from 2021 to 2022.
AWARDS
Shortlisted for the Art Solo Award 2018.
ARTIST’S EXHIBITIONS
Art and Design Degree Show at Edinburgh University, College of Art, Edinburgh, Scotland, 2018.
Rift at White Space Gallery, Edinburgh, Scotland, 2018.
Third Year Art Exhibition at Scot Palette: St Margaret’s House, Edinburgh, Scotland, 2017.
After the Storm at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh, Scotland, 2017.
Walk this Way at West Barns Art, Dunbar, Scotland, 2017.
Earth, Landscape, and Ecology at Art Scape Gibraltar Point, Toronto, Canada, 2016.
ARTIST’S RESIDENCIES
Three months artist residency at Saruya, Fujiyoshida, Japan, 2018.
Three months artist residency at Sachaqa Centro De Arte, Tarapoto, Peru, 2017.
Three months artist residency at Art Scape Gibraltar Point, Toronto, Canada, 2016.
