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Mark Carroll grew up in a household filled with artistic activity.
His father, Richard, a full-time sculptor and master carver, created
religious woodcarvings for churches and granite sculptures for public
spaces and memorial monuments. His mother, Mary, a landscape and
portrait painter, worked primarily in oils.
In 1973, he received a Bachelor's Degree in
Liberal Arts, Art, from Buffalo State College. In 1979, he completed
the NYS Teaching Certification K-12 and later received a Master's Degree
in Art Education. He taught high school art in Western New
York for eight years. |
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The most profound influence upon his approach to art is the Appalachian
Trail. In 1977 and again in 1986, he walked the wilderness trail from
Georgia to Maine. Living in the natural beauty of the forest and
mountains for five months at a time left a deep impression. |
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Mark began his professional art career as a woodcarver, crafting duck
decoys and caricature figures. Polishing his techniques, he moved on
to realistically rendered birds and expressive human characters.
After his father died, Mark was asked if he would
carry on sculpting of the large religious statues. For several years
he worked full time carving life-size wood figures for churches. |
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He also carved scientifically accurate reproductions for the Buffalo
Science Museum. Working from the fossil remains, he carved an
Archaeopteryx, the first bird, with its wings extended in flight.
For the Discovery Room he carved a baby mastodon
for children to climb. He also carved a 32x enlargement of a Western
Conifer Seed Bug for the entomology department from detailed drawings he
made using a microscope to view the specimen. |
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After leaving teaching, Mark worked as a self-employed free-lance sculptor
maintaining a studio in East Aurora, NY. For the past 18 years, he has
been a sculptor/model-maker for toy companies like Fisher Price,
Toys-R-Us, and Kid Design. |
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The
experience of carving a wide variety of complex, detailed woodcarvings and
later the exacting discipline of industrial model-making have refined his
craftsmanship. The beauty of nature he experienced on the Appalachian
Trail has provided a philosophical basis for his sculptural imagery.
Mark's sculptural forms, representational or abstract,
relate to the nature's organic shapes and to the human figure.
His range of media evolved from woodcarving to include stone, terra cotta,
bronze, steel, and stainless steel. The artistic statement is always
affirmative. |
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