Mark Akins
Painter
Artist Statement
Mark Akins, a 3rd generation Coloradan, is a member of the Plein Air Artists of Colorado, Plein Air Painters of New Mexico, Outdoor Painters Society (Texas), Oil Painters of America and the American Impressionist Society. His mission is to “paint for the love of color. My hope is that upon viewing one of my pieces, a memory is kindled, an emotion touched, or you simply wish you could have been at the time and location I have attempted to capture on canvas.” Mark’s atmospheric paintings capture color, light and shadow as they fall across forms in the landscape.
About the Artist
“I have been blessed with a wonderful wife, family, and friends. God has also blessed me with an affinity for the beauty around us and a desire to capture it on canvas. My motto: “Life is a journey, not a race.” truly reflects my life.” He earned awards for his art during jr. high in the National Scholastic Competition. Family friends recruited him out of high school to join their graphic arts business. Instead Mark enrolled at the University of Colorado as a fine art major. “There I found drawing skills and representational art disdained in favor of slapping, sloshing and ‘expressing’. After two years of frustration I changed my major!”
Disenchanted with what he believed to be the parameters in the Art World, Mark joined his father’s business selling of all things - tires. “I was able to incorporate art once in a while doing advertising layouts, but creativity wise it was pretty stifling.” An expansion of their business led to a branch in Phoenix. This move eventually brought Mark back to the world of art, although not as an artist. “Long story - short, my father and I had always had a difficult relationship and circumstances eventually necessitated a split. We opened an art gallery in Scottsdale. While I was ambitious in landing and representing many fine artists I never took up the brush or displayed my own work. The assumed split never occurred and revenues from the art business were siphoned to support the tire business. After seven struggle filled years I severed ties with my father, closed the gallery and returned to school to get a teaching degree.
Five days after graduating summa cum laude from A.S.U. Mark moved his family back to Colorado where he taught for 16 years. Graduate research at the University of Colorado, Boulder focused on literacy and coincidently brought Mark greater insights into the artistic process. “As an adult artist who attempts to capture what he sees it sounds contradictory, but study of early childhood artistic expression reveals that they draw what they know about an object, not what they see of an object. That knowledge is rooted in language and as vocabulary builds, so too does the ability to draw more accurately. For me, art is about an understood communication. If a third party needs to ‘translate’ a picture’s meaning, I feel the artist has failed in their primary mission”
At the University of Colorado, Boulder Mark earned his Master's degree, and taught kindergarten through 3rd grade for 15 years. Now, as a full-time artist, he paints mainly in oil with a focus on plein air and impressionist inspired studio landscapes. Mark participates in annual plein air events throughout the west including Jackson Hole, Escalante and Moab, Utah, and several in Colorado earning numerous awards.
“I gained an appreciation, respect and understanding of the focused pursuit of creating fine representational art through artists I represented in my gallery such as Everette Raymond Kinstler, Peter Cox, Don Stone, Joseph Shephard, and Delbert Gish.” Mark has honed his craft studying with Doug Dawson, Josh Been, and Don Sahli. Mark’s work is included in numerous private and public collections.
...And the journey goes on.