Artwork of the Week - 13th October 2014

Mark Harrison - Low Tide, Bankside Pier (London)

We were delighted to announce this week that three of our artists have reached the final of the Artist of the Year 2014 competition by Artist & Illustrator Magazine. Mark Harrison is one of the 50 artists who has been shortlisted from over 3,000 entries.  Mark will be exhibiting at the prestigious Mall Galleries in London in January 2015.

If you, like us are a fan of Mark's work you can vote for him on the Artist & Illustrator magazine website. The artist with the most votes will be presented with the readers' choice award at the Mall Galleries.

Mark Harrison was born in Leicester in 1951, he studied Illustration at Wimbledon School of Art and became a full time illustrator in 1981. From then until 2003 Mark painted nearly 500 book jacket illustrations for major UK and USA publishers as well as paintings for advertising, editorial and music industry clients. A book in 1990 was published entitled "Mark Harrison's Dreamlands" which contained over ninety of his jacket paintings.  This book won him the award from the British Science Fiction Association's prize for best artwork of that year.

Mark Harrison became well known in the USA from his commissions for publishers, particularly in the Science Fiction fields. He had many trips to the USA to exhibit and sell artworks.

By 1994, after travelling to Asia Mark began to built up a portfolio of work that reflected his personal interest in Asian subjects. This was also a time when he experimented with different mediums from acrylics to pastels, metallic paints and then to digital. In 2005 he changed again to oil on board, his landscapes and cityscapes were also produced as prints and sold throughout the UK via a number of well known high street outlets.

He now concentrates on original paintings and a small collection of Limited Edition Prints which go for sale in fine art galleries in the UK. Low Tide, Bankside Pier (London) is this week's Artwork of the Week here at Union Art. This piece focuses on the colour and atmosphere that is created by the light. The original picture was painted in oil on board and is unfortunately sold but we are pleased to be able to offer the piece as a Signed Limited Edition Print to our customers. To view Mark Harrison's full collection of Signed Limited Edition Prints please take a look at Union Art.