Mark’s paintings are based on found imagery, primarily from photojournalistic sources. These images act as a starting point for his work. Eventually the photograph is abandoned all together as he tries to resolve the work in terms of what the painting itself requires. Mark is interested in how the narrative of the original photograph shifts once it is translated into paint. Mark’s work is based on representation, but only in so much as representation offers a framework on which to develop a language of brushstrokes.
Mark Crofton Bell completed his undergraduate studies at the Ontario College of Art and Design in 1989 and his Masters degree at Chelsea College in London in 2009. He is one of the founding members of the Toronto-based artist collective Painting Disorders. Bell has exhibited in artist-run centres and public galleries across Canada including the Art Gallery of Ontario.
As a painting instructor Mark tries to push his students in a direction that might eventually yield a paint vocabulary unique to each individual. Finding one’s own voice in the well-trodden field of paint is perhaps the most difficult task of an art student, but Mark is always reassured by the fresh variations he sees every day. He teaches Drawing and Painting in the Art and Art History Department at Sheridan College, a joint program with The University of Toronto, Mississauga.