ART CITIES: Athens -Carly Mark

Like so many who grew up in the U.S.A, Carly Mark remembers moments from her childhood in Detroit full with images of branded food packaging. Though most adults now are wary of such marketing strategies, it’s impossible to deny how the colorful, bold graphics once seemed harmless, if not delightful, and became entwined with memories of certain people and places.

By DimitrisLempesis
Photo: The Breeder Gallery Archive

In ”Good Buy Humman”, her first solo exhibition the American artist Carly Mark presents paintings, sculptures, video and installations with references, to her persistence at the gummies company Haribo. For the artist, her relationship with her grandmother, has always been connected to Weight Watchers branded food labels. Carly Mark would snack on Weight Watchers products, as well as mass-produced foods like Haribo gummies, Cheetos, and Doritos. When she moved to New York at 18 to study at the School of Visual Arts, she abated the culture shock by exploring her surroundings as much as possible. Bodegas, filled with familiar food brands, became landmarks as she filled out her mental map of the city. Carly Mark’s practice focuses on residues of contemporary life. Food packagings from consumer mass-produced products are combined with elements of pop culture in her work. Her work unfolds almost like a personal diary combining images from the Haribo bags with references to movies, literature and internet platforms, thus creating a personal narrative. In an interview the artist says “I was asking myself, ‘What do I want to make?’ I started thinking about, ‘What do you like?’ And the only thing I could think of, at the time, was ‘snacks. I don’t know if it was because I had so much anxiety that I was leaning towards comfort objects, like comfort foods. But I started illustrating packages of snacks that I was buying”.  In the exhibition is also on presentation her video “Good Buy Human”, where three cartoon characters are coming to life taking terrifying dimensions. Her exhibition is the result of her Breeder Residency Program, started on July 2015, the program invites International artists, to live, work and interact with the social fabric of Athens.

Info: Curator: Stamatia Dimitrakopoulos, The Breeder Gallery, 45 Iasonos Street, Athens, Duration: 23/6-31/8/16, Days & Hours: Tue-Fri 12:00-20:00, Sat 12:00-18:00, http://thebreedersystem.com