Mark Whalen’s Supernatural Art
- Words
- Sarah Press
Los Angeles based painter Mark Whalen is best known for his elaborate puzzle and labyrinth compositions that seem to capture bizarre situations of the human lives and experiences, compressed into tightly woven narratives that reflect the artist’s everyday life challenge.
His glossy resin-covered paintings are glimpses into meticulously crafted fantasy worlds filled with squirming characters, flashy color schemes, and continuous geometric patterns. Characters can be seen in the throes of ambiguous actions, architectural anomalies and intricate textural beads. The use of channing oppositions reflects our life’s puzzling duality, provoking dark humor through glowing colors, chaos through controlled detail and the sublime through a alluring synesthesia that casts new light on humanity. His tightly controlled painting technique expresses satirical social narratives in seemingly mundane situations.
All images © Julian Berman
