Joey Mars Exhibit Opens Summer Season at HyArts Center

By: iO Staff, May 22, 2012

JOEY MARS - Quacks and Quarks Remix, on display at the HyArts Center's Guyer Barn from May 24 to June 10.

The Hyannis Harbor Arts Center at the Guyer Barn launches its summer 2012 season with Hybrids of the Singularity: Paintings and Drawings by Joey Mars in an exhibit that opens Thursday, May 24, and runs through June 10. The public is invited to the opening reception on May 24 from 7 to 10 PM to view the work and meet the artist.

Mars’ work combines styles of low-brow surrealism, modern expressionism and graffiti as he combines imagery, design and color to spark the imagination. He uses organic shapes and patterns punctuated by repeating symbols and characters to create an alternative language.

Of the current show, Mars said “it’s a reflection upon the present and past and a gaze into the future of technology and the magical, mystical world as we approach this Mayan prophecy of 2012 and the event horizon of faster and faster technological evolutionary advances.”

Born in Worcester and raised in Wilbraham, Mars (née Joseph Marchesseault) attended art school at Vesper Lincoln George School of Art and the Art Institute of Boston. Now living in Barnstable with his wife and daughter, Mars' art has been seen throughout the world from the boardwalk shops of Venice Beach and Indonesia to the galleries of Provincetown and New York.

Commercially his work has promoted the products, entities and licenses of Budweiser, Pepsi, K2, Glen Plake, Grateful Dead, Aerosmith, Live Nation, WBCN 104.1, WFNX101.7, and The Boston Phoenix. But Mars might be best known locally for his murals decorating Shop Therapy Provincetown and Shop Therapy Northampton.

Mars is a partner in Helltown Workshop, a performance space and art gallery in Provincetown and is a former studio member and past president of The Worcester Artist Group Inc., a nonprofit center for the arts.