Mark Ravitz   Art & Design

I am a native New Yorker, born on Aug.18, 1948. I grew up in Manhattan, on 11th St. and 2nd Ave. I attended P.S. 19, J.H.S. 60, Music & Art H.S. and received a B.F.A. from NYU School of the Arts in 1970. My environment played a large part in my evolution as an artist. From the Beatniks in Greenwich Village of the 50s, to the Hippies on St. Marks Place in the 60s and the Disco days of the 70s, my mind and heart were opened to the variety of expression surrounding me and making a formative impression upon me.

I've been drawing and painting from the age of 7. As I was growing up, my parents owned and operated a laundry and dry cleaning business. I became exposed to some of their customers, artists like Roy Lichtenstein, Malcolm Morley and photographer Jay Meisel, when I delivered their laundry. It was thru this personal perspective that I took in the art worlds of the 60s, from studio to gallery.

Somewhere around the age of 17, I was taken thru a door at the CBS Television Production Center, on West 57th St. in Manhattan. Upon entering the scenic shop floor, I took in a variety of scenic elements, varying in motif- Greek columns, modern soap opera sets, a brownstone stoop, etc. The idea of set design as three dimensional painting has remained with me since that visit.

It is from these roots and environments that my own spectrum of light has evolved.
I also like to scuba dive.