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<p><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><b>We're Sorry!</b></font></p>
<p><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">You apparently are not using a
frames-capable Web browser, which is required to view <a href="http://sobs.org">The
Site of Big Shoulders</a>.</font></p>
<p><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"> We recommend that you download,
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<p><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">Mark Shepherd bio:<br></font></p>
<p><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><font size="4">I</font><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">n
my most recent work I try to approach each drawing/collage without preconception
or intent. In other words, there is no "big idea" present before I begin.
Instead it has been an exploration into the chosen materials or markings
themselves. </font></font></p>
<p><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">There
is usually an ambiguous starting point — sometimes a particular
word or phrase, for instance the recent phrase "Seven Ton Moonbeam" translated
itself into "C Jumping a Waterfall." In my mind, a word or phrase can
predetermine the potential direction an image may take. </font></p>
<p><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><img src="images/msiconpots.jpg" alt="NEWSPAPER" width="118" height="144" border="0" align="right">It
is through this exploration the resulting images begin to hold a personal
significance for me. These current sets of images represent a single freeze-frame,
taken from a set of fictional events, or possibly obscured personal narratives.
Often there is the feeling that something has taken place before or after.
Or that something is about to happen, as if it were a scene lifted from
a dream. </font></p>
<p><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><img src="images/msicongrapes.jpg" alt="BEREAVEMENT" width="97" height="112" border="0" align="left">The
events depicted relate more to a dreamlike adventure than real-life circumstances.
I have also chosen to explore familiar images from childhood and alter
them in order to evoke a fake history or inspire nostalgia for a period
in time that never truly existed. </font></p>
<p><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><img src="images/msiconchair.jpg" alt="LONELY" width="108" height="147" border="0" align="right">I
have great interest in the fragility each image holds, the impossible
combination that occurs only during sleep and dreaming, and the personal
glossary of ideas that expand from this state. I like to think of the
scraps of found imagery as the point of departure for the story, rather
than my forcing a story upon them. This is why it is important that the
material I choose carry its own previous history. </font></p>
<p><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">The process
of collecting disparate scraps from science textbooks, old magazines,
children's coloring books and other found material becomes as much a part
of the emerging image as the mark-making. A piece often becomes about
the search and desire to combine those emergent narrative symbols that
seem charged with a familiar yet distant emotion. </font></p>
<p><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><img src="images/msicontomato.jpg" alt="ACCEPTED" width="119" height="90" border="0" align="left">When
successful, all the elements fall together with irony and tension while
all other realities are obliterated, leaving the viewer as participant
inside the picture. The image then carries the weight of an obscure, personal
"reality." Most important, the final image actually gains a significant
evocative quality I could not have expressed in any other way.</font></p>
<p align="right"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><em>—
Mark Shepherd</em></font></p>
<p align="center"> </p>
<p align="center"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">Artwork
and Text Copyright © 1999-2001<br>
Mark Shepherd<br>
<br>
Production Copyright © 2002<br>
The Site of Big Shoulders<br>
<br>
All Rights Reserved</font></p>
<p align="center"> </p>
<p><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">Follow the links to view individual collages:<br>
<a href="msedgeboy.html">Edge</a><br>
<a href="msfacelifted.html">Facelifted</a><br>
<a href="msfoowld.html">Foowld</a><br>
<a href="msforsniffles.html">For Sniffles</a><br>
<a href="mshearingaid.html">Talking Head</a><br>
<a href="msmountainboy.html">Mtn Boy</a><br>
<a href="msmsc_falls.html">C Jumps a Waterfall</a><br>
<a href="msnestspra.html">Nestspray</a><br>
<a href="msponyboy.html">Pony Boy</a><br>
<a href="msroadway.html">Roadway</a><br>
<a href="mssatelite.html">Satelite</a><br>
<a href="msaroundthe.html">All Around the Marshmallow Tree</a><br>
</font>
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