Mark Sylva is an artist with an eye for beauty, who was born gazing at the waters around Cape Cod. His love of the sea and boating was an early influence that ultimately led to a career in painting. Mark studied art and design at the New England School of Art and Design. After graduating, he ran a successful design business for 20 years. Afterwards, he moved to California and found his way back to his other passion of painting. Sylva has now returned to his east coast roots, living in New York state along the shore of Hampton Bay. Beginning at a young age, Sylva had painted with watercolors. He has transitioned mediums and now uses oil paint to accomplish his varying landscapes. Living in Napa Valley, Mark painted several years with the internationally recognized artist John McCormick. He also spent time in Sedona, Arizona capturing the intense earth colors of the Southwest. While living in Napa Valley and traveling around France, Mark painted the subtle tones of the wine countries. Sylva’s art tends to be of a loose representation and abstract quality of the subject. His landscapes draw from ideas of simplicity and infuse the tranquility of isolation and space. Depth and space created with layers present a certain solitude that make Sylva’s work especially unique. This taps into aspects that the viewer could see as a forever beyond or destination to somewhere, as well as the idea of feeling alone but not lonely. His creative process begins with a small simple sketch or a photo that he typically sketches. Some of Sylva’s compositions are created solely from memory and others are so burned into his mind that he occasionally can create with no photo or on-site reference. He does very little en plein air, and when he does, most of the pieces are taken back to his studio to complete fully.