Aviation Artist and Author

Artist in Residency

If your museum or organisation would like to talk about the possibility of Mark doing a similar ‘Artist in Residency’ with you then please get in touch directly with the artist at mark@posart.com

 

Bentley priory - may 2019

“I had a wonderful week at Bentley Priory in May 2019, here are some of the highlights”.

My ‘studio’ for the week, Dowding’s office is just the other side of the wall. I was here every day during opening hours apart from an hour on the Friday when I did their popular ‘Friday’ talk based around ‘The life of an artist’.

The week was all about inviting children to help me paint my new Battle of Britain painting which they all did with great care and skill. (photo by Paul Tricker)

The idea of the painting was to portray all squadrons that flew with Fighter Command during the Battle of Britain as a symbolic tribute to The Few.

By the end of the week, over 40 children had contributed to the painting, each one signing their name on the back of the canvas and receiving a signed certificate.

On the final day we were delighted to welcome Battle of Britain pilot Archie McInnes to launch his book but also to paint his Hurricane on the canvas!

 

Another special guest on the final day was James Brown, owner and pilot of Hurricane R4118 who also added his unique aircraft to the scene.

The final day with Archie and Jonny Cracknell who wrote Archie’s biography in the famous Rotunda at Bentley Priory, I’m very proud to have nine of my paintings hanging in this famous room.

And this was the final result!

The finished painting (with all the young artist’s signatures on the back) now hangs in Bentley Priory and prints are sold to raise money for the museum.

The museum’s website is here https://bentleypriorymuseum.org.uk

RAF Museum Hendon 2012

In 1987 Mark became the first ever Artist in Residence at the Royal Air Force Museum Hendon in what was the first major exhibition of his work.

In 2012, Mark returned to the museum to take up residency once again for two weeks to celebrate the 25th Anniversary of the first event.

Artist in Residencies take many forms but Mark’s approach has always been to involve the public as much as possible in whatever he does. So for the first week he sat and painted the Westland Lysander in the Battle of Britain Hall and in the second week he painted the Harrier in the Milestones of Flight Hall.

As always, Mark invited younger visitors (and a few older ones!) to have a go at painting on the canvas.  Being acrylic paint, it’s very safe and very easy to paint over if the young artists make a mistake, which they rarely do!

The young artists all signed the back of the canvas to preserve a record of their contribution

It’s easy for any age group to have ago, the little ones can paint rocks or clouds and the older ones can try small aircraft or trees etc

During Mark’s residency, he gave daily talks on how he paints aircraft using a powerpoint presentation.  These talks proved to be well attended on each occasion.