SAS Interiors: American Painter: Mark Innerst

I came across an amazing artist recently and had to share some of his momentous pieces. Mark Innerst, who grew up in Pennsylvania and New York, has forever been inspired by his surroundings to create a mixture of abstract and realist compositions. A recent article in Elle Decor put it perfectly, "The next time you’re in Manhattan, stand at the center of a midtown crosswalk. Then look up the avenue and squint a bit. The jumble of language on billboards and shop signs falls away, and you’re left with a mosaic of stone, glass, and hazy light." Some of Innerst's painting titles, like Near Times Square and Entering Bryant Park, give you a glimpse of what his paintings are all about. "Innerst captures the sense of wonder a visitor might bring to a present-day walk through midtown, but he could just as easily be painting the streets as they appeared during the 1920s and ’30s, the golden age of the skyscraper."

Many Distant Penthouses, 2010

Credit: Courtesy DC Moore Gallery, New York

Ocean Drive, 2004

Credit: Courtesy DC Moore Gallery, New York

Columbus Circle Seen from the Essex House, 2007

Credit: Courtesy DC Moore Gallery, New York

Entering Bryant Park, 2010

Credit: Courtesy DC Moore Gallery, New York

With recently dividing his time living in Pennsylvania and Cape May, New Jersey, Innhate is influenced by what he sees around him, “Usually I sit on the fringe of the beach,” he says, “but I started planting myself in the middle. When it came time to paint, people, umbrellas, everything became fragmented. I saw the pattern of the bathers as a stream that went through the painting.”