"Mark Bryan Paints," Garry Eister, 2019

How The West Was Won, (c) Mark Bryan

This twenty-two minute documentary by modern composer and video producer Garry Eister captures the creative process of pop surrealist painter and satirist Mark Bryan.  In the video, which was shot over a multi-week period, Bryan starts with a blank canvas and walks us through the development of a major work titled “How The West Was Won.”

Part discourse on art, part a treatise on technique, and part interview, the video reveals Bryan’s use of an “under painting,” done in two-tone acrylic, to establish his major themes and ideas.  Once he has the overall composition in place, the artist moves into the realm of color.  We watch the work unfold as he colors, shades, highlights details, and adds and deletes compositional elements.

Serendipity plays a role in the work too.  When a tortoise wanders from a nearby sanctuary onto Bryan’s studio grounds, the artist learns from friends that the reptile is a good omen.  After the tortoise is returned to the sanctuary, Bryan decides to add him into the painting.

The film is both intimate and light-hearted, enhanced at several points by Eister’s lovely musical compositions.

Though the documentary’s overall pacing felt relaxed, I found the final scenes to be quite dramatic.   Images that had begun as fuzzy and nebulous shapes had been transformed into razor sharp icons.  Colors became vivid, and the emotion of the painting, simultaneously whimsical and incisive, was on full display.

The video is available at https://vimeo.com/channels/bookofartists.  If you have an Apple TV, you can download the Vimeo app for free and watch the film on your television.

For more information about Garry Eister, please see: http://eistermusic.com

For more information about Mark Bryan, please see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Bryan_%28artist%29