Mark
Cross started producing art during his childhood. After studying as an
engineer, at the age of 23 he moved with his young family to his wife’s
village, Liku, on the island of Niue and it was during these
early years that a strong philosophic and stylistic foundation was established
for his career as an artist. Due to this continued isolation, Cross has worked
on the 'periphery', of the traditional art industry.
Cross has developed a reputation as one
of the South Pacific’s leading contemporary realist painters and
now divides his time between studios in Niue and New Zealand
while travelling and exhibiting elsewhere.
His paintings over time have emerged from extended immersion in a small,
isolated, water-bound, natural environment into a universal vision that
questions the foibles of Mankind.
Elements
of the New Zealand and Niue environment became the atmospheric stages for these
allegorical communications although more recently he has employed similarly
unique landscapes from around the world.
In their ethereal, visionary way, the works warn of the dire ecological
imperatives that face both a small island and a planet.
Mark
Cross has achieved through his work a uniqueness that avoids the trappings of
provincialism, so often associated with realism, and replaces it with an
acutely perceptive worldview.
The
artist has also supported art production in his community with the
establishment of a sculpture park in the rain forest in the east of Niue.
Besides painting, photography, sculpture, installation, video and writing are
included in the artist's oeuvre.
Paintings by Mark are to be found in public,
private and corporate collections in Australasia, Asia, America, the Middle
East and Europe.
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