Mark Tracy

His Work: Fine Artist (Painter)

“There’s an energy in the building. I mean I could paint anywhere but I want to paint in the city.”

Mark Tracy tells me that this old building has about 180 to 200 artists in here. On our way up to his workspace we take an elevator—not the kind with little white buttons and metallic doors that slide open but an elevator with a metal grate that you pull down from the ceiling to close the door, an elevator where you can see the floors and the inside of the building as you rise from story to story. Mark Tracy moved into this particular studio only 8 months ago. His old space looked over the city and his current studio overlooks the water. He says “I did like looking at the city, this is a bigger space so I moved over here. The water is a real kind of annoyance to me. I want to see the buildings, I want to see the people, I want to see some of the arguments and fights on a Friday night while I paint.” He tells me that if you study the New York school artists of the 1950’s you can see the change in their work once they move out of the city and get that posh nice studio. He thinks the work they produced while being in the city is more rich and of higher quality.

I ask more about why we doesn’t like that his studio overlooks the water and he says “I really wouldn’t want to see the water.”  Mark Tracy tells me about behavioral studies on the sociology of water or of communities living next to water. Mr. Tracy says that if you ask an American where they are going for vacation that it is almost always a water based location. He tells me “well, then water is almost synonymous with relaxing. I’m not interested in relaxing, I’m interested in pushing the envelope, cutting deep with a dull knife. I’m not interested in something easy going on here. So the waters very much not what I’m about.”

Mr. Tracy tells me about a time where he shared a studio space with two other people. That was a mistake he says and it doesn’t work for him. He tells me that work is introspective, full of existential thoughts, deep questions and “for me to do what I’m doing it has to be a little bit more controlled.”

I ask him how he feels when he works in his space, if he likes it, doesn’t like it, and how it works for him. Mark Tracy tells me “for me an easy word to come up with would be a sanctuary—the ultimate place.” He has a lot of books around. He does tell me that space is critical for him because of the large scale of his work. Mr. Tracy says he needs his space to be clean and organized.

I ask him to describe the work environment he feels he works best in and he replies “my own environment. By myself. I need isolation.” He tells me he is a thinker and is very much into diligence, facts and figures and he needs to be able to work uninterrupted. He says “that’s why I like being self employed” and he tells me ”I work in isolation here.” Mark Tracy tells me he needs to be able to have control over his workspace.

I ask Mark Tracy about his path to being a full time artist and he says “I’ve basically been an artist my whole entire life so music, visual art, writer— philosophy, but primarily visual art and painting is the medium.” He tells me that his dad was an art teacher and had his masters in art. Mr. Tracy says that at a very young age, the name of Picasso and Kandinsky and the New York school artists were well known to him. Mark Tracy is the founder and leader of the Seattle Art Group.

He tells me that this is a troubled art community, a fragmented one but that there is a lot of potential and quality work here. He says it’s a mood swing state and the weather is really rough on you, raining for ten days and then two days of sun. Mr. Tracy says “to me the art that comes out of this area should have an edge and a lot of what you see is commercial and I see that as imported art. I don’t look at it as congruent with—you know what I’m saying? As far as an area having a voice.” He says it’s about tuning in, even at a cost to the artist— and that demands respect. He tells me about the history of great painters’ right in this area and that the art community needs to build on that.

When I ask Mr. Tracy why painting he offers me academic and concrete explanations. He says “painting registers with the neuro-synaptic  development of the brain due to the evolution of the brain.” I enjoy our conversation as he continues to make reference to other works and ideas that I’ve come across in both psychology, philosophy, and music. He tells me how an experience with art raises us up from a slumber, so that in a way art is about piercing the darkness.

I ask Mark Tracy to put his experience with his work into a few words and he says “what I’m doing is meaningful too, I mean to me at a cost. I mean it’s not popular and my budget is tight.” He tells me he works hard and is passionate with his work. “Most artists have to ask those questions a lot more than anybody else—why am I doing this?” Because you work really hard and the money is inconsistent, what if you don’t sell a painting? He sells his paintings anywhere from eight to 20,000 dollars. He tells me you have to be doing this for much bigger reasons than money.