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[above] CHARTING HARM'S WAY, 1993, acrylic on paper, 94 x 124.5 cm, courtesy of the City of Ottawa, photo: David Barbour, © CARCC 2008. Story by Nigel Beale
Until the 25th of January, the Ottawa Art Gallery is hosting Mark Marsters: Martsterpiece Theatre, a retrospective exhibition on the work of a remarkable painter, sculptor, and storyteller.
In 1994, Marsters (1963-2002) created a series of sixteen paintings and stories based on video footage of a trip he took that year through Western Canada, during which he interviewed random strangers about a fictitious character he’d made up named Richard Roe. The series, called Following Richard Roe, crafts the strangers’ answers into a narrative about who they thought this fellow was.
I met Mark Marsters and his wife Sandra in 1985, the year we all arrived in Ottawa. I came to know Mark best during the years my daughters attended Sandra’s daycare. Ours was an easy rapport, exercised mostly through attempts to out-pun each other. Though humour headlined, there was in Mark’s personality an easily recognized seriousness. A serious funniness. Laughter may have been the front, but behind it—and this soon became evident as I got to know his work—there lay a powerful drive to address the social and political: to poke fun at stupidities, deflate pomposity, illuminate and condemn injustices. Mark spent much of his artistic life inflicting humour to make people laugh at foolishness.
His talent was serious, too. Many of his paintings, sculptures and sundry other works combine messages of barbed playfulness with stunningly realistic landscape and portraiture. One particular piece I remember seeing at Vicki Henry’s Ufundi gallery on Sussex Drive captured artist Russell Yuristy’s likeness with striking accuracy. Another has a boatful of misfits floating across a river, Rubicon-like, at dusk. While the painting centrally ridicules maverick Cornwall mayor Ron Martel for his handling of a cigarette smuggling issue, the water and sky in the painting showcase just how impressive Mark’s painterly powers were.
FOR THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KINGSIZE, 1996, acrylic and enamel on masonite, 244.3 x 427.9 cm, courtesy of the Marsters family, photo: David Barbour, © CARCC 2008. 
FOR THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KINGSIZE, detail In most of Mark’s work, this ability to depict reality is present within atmospheres of nightmarish, David Lynchian quality: that which lies under the overturned stone, beneath a patina of normalcy. In a portrait Mark painted of me, for instance, the faint, almost imperceptible shadow of a devil sits perched atop one shoulder. It took a friend to subsequently point out a penis included discretely as a crease in the pants I wear. These kinds of painted puns, puckish observations, and double entendres are found throughout Mark’s provocative oeuvre.
Some have labeled this quirky darkness off-putting. Perhaps because of this, Mark’s paintings were not widely embraced by the mainstream during his lifetime. Frustratingly so, for him, I suspect. And yet, this was his true voice; one that he honoured by refusing to pander to the popular. As Mark once put it, “I am creating these little characters that have some infamous little qualities for your enjoyment, for your entertainment, definitely for my entertainment.”
I remember Mark for his commitment to art; for doing what he loved to do without compromise; for his estimable creative energy and versatility; for voicing deeply felt concerns about issues that affected him, his family and his community; for telling fantastical stories to his children at bedtime; and for being genuinely friendly and interested in others.
To gain better perspective of this complex man, I asked a non-random selection of people who knew him in varying capacities to provide short narratives on who they thought he was. A pretty obvious consensus arises.
Dave Draves on Mark Marsters
i think about mark a lot still
what he would think of a funny phrase or joke
what he would bring to a conversation too stiff or dry
what he would add to an idea evolving into a plan
he always had something
often too humorous or undermining to be even marginally accepted
or too spontaneous to be worth the consideration
but i always enjoyed this exchange
and i valued the times we could indulge ourselves in ideas streaming into ridiculous plots
it was usually over a breakfast special in the Byward market
or driving to a thrift store to rummage albums and found art potentials
he was constantly thinking of new projects and what it would take to see them through
and he often made them happen
the more absurd the more likely he could get it done
and have a story to tell as well
he loved making stories
and was aware of his own fragile existence
but wouldn't have you treat him different for it
he loved to stick it to the big bully in his art pieces
maybe as a kind of revenge for the hand he was dealt
the funny guy as hero
i remember him most for this
his great creative humour and wit and despise for pretension
and he remains a secret ally
when i'm conspiring with mark-friendly thoughts
Dave Draves is music producer and studio owner of Little Bullhorn Prods. 
DOUBLE BLUE METEOR, 1998, acrylic on found object, 67.5 x 38.1 cm, courtesy of the Marsters family, photo: David Barbour, © CARCC 2008. Victoria Henry on Mark Marsters
I knew Mark as a dear, uncomplicated and genuine friend in my capacity as his art dealer and sometime employer. I see him still in his black-rimmed glasses from Value Village, bandaged fingers and youthful energy. We made a good pair. Mark was often frustrated that his work was misunderstood. I couldn’t understand how the public could fail to be moved by his paintings and yet be so captivated by the facile imagery of so many others.
For over two years, during the worst of the economic slowdown in the early nineties, we struggled to make the gallery pay. After months of going further into debt Mark said to me one October morning, “Don’t stay open for me,” so I closed two months later. The highlight of the hundreds of exhibitions held at Ufundi Gallery was Mark’s Big 30 show. He celebrated his thirty years of life with a wonderful exhibition that included The Brown Sox Secret Weapon, a humorous self-portrait with him as baseball pitcher and his son Benjamin as the secret weapon. This work personified Mark’s quirky sense of humour, his detailed painting technique and the love of his son. It reminds me daily of his great talent and love of life.
Vicki Henry is Director of the Canada Council Art Bank.
Don McVeigh on Mark Marsters
I met Mark in 1989 when he was volunteering with the then new Ottawa art Gallery. He was helping other artists. Mark was always generous with his support for others. He organised fund raising poster projects for the Snowsuit Fund and spent a lot of free time on various art committees. He was energetic!
I always liked Mark’s sense of humour. It is, of course, important in almost all his paintings. He seemed to cherish little bits of weirdness the way a small boy might collect rocks and seashells. Some people collect rocks to throw at others; Mark just arranged them in interesting patterns. His paintings often pointed to human foibles, but I think he is very gentle about it. Not sarcastic and mean on ironic and indifferent, Mark seemed to enjoy the parade of human folly. You can almost see him there with a kid on his shoulders and a couple of others holding his hands standing on the curb watching the March of Folly and cheering as the floats go by.
As for kids, children were important to Mark, both his own family and children in general. He enjoyed their view of the world. I always had the feeling that Sandra and the kids enriched Mark’s take on things.
I consider myself lucky to have known Mark and still find myself thinking, “Mark would get a kick out of this,” or “Mark could use that.” Ottawa was blessed by his short visit.
Don McVeigh is a teacher at the Ottawa School of Art.
THE MIRACULOUS ANNUAL CIRCUMCISION OF ST. EPIDERMOUS, 1990, acrylic, wood and mixed media on wood, 38.5 x 41.5 x 18.5 cm, Collection of the Canada Council Art Bank, photo: David Barbour, © CARCC 2008. Patrick Grew on Mark Marsters
I met Mark through his future wife Sandra at Mount Allison University in Sackville, New Brunswick. He and I instantly became friends. I loved his wit and sense of humour. We hung out on the yearbook. We all worked on it. Sandra was the editor. Mark and I took photos for the book together.
When we left Mount A and moved to Ottawa, I often spoke of Mark and his art to students of mine at Merivale High School. As a matter of fact, I took a carload of them to see his first art showing held at Ottawa U. I wanted the kids who had artistic ambition and talent to see that they could live their dreams of becoming an artist just like Mark was doing. Of course I made a point of mentioning the huge support that Mark got from Sandra, which allowed him to pursue the dream. Mark gave the kids his time and spoke with them honestly about his path and where he had landed.
Mark always had time for friends, even those of us who didn't share the same interests. He loved people and most of all his family. I lost touch with Mark after I moved to Kingston but I can't imagine that ever changed. I knew him as a loyal, loving non-judgmental person.
Patrick Grew is an award-winning math teacher who lives in Kingston, Ontario.
Jeff Fox on Mark Marsters
Back in the late 1980s, I was taken by my friend Pat Grew (my high school teacher at the time) to see a small independent art show. To be completely honest, I don't really remember any of the works at the show (it was such a long time ago, and I was pretty young) but that show was memorable for one particular exchange I had when meeting Mark.
After I'd had a look around, as the show was wrapping up, I was introduced to Mark. He politely welcomed us and seemed genuinely happy that we'd come. Immediately he asked “Are any of you artists...?”, and just as I’d begun to sheepishly raise my hand, he went on to finish the question, “...or are you going to be getting real jobs?” Now, this coming from a serious artist at his (and my first) real art show, I felt terribly embarrassed to have been taken in by the joke. I probably didn't listen too much to what followed, being too much the self-absorbed teen.
But later, as time went by, I began to see the question as a joke with bigger implications. It was a question that would launch a thousand more for me over the years, and it was a question which made me see the world, my world, very differently. It was a question that playfully, and likely inadvertently, presented a philosophy; a sort of time-release capsule of wisdom that caused me to think and explore and examine, as I believe all art should on some level. Based on what I now know of Mark's work, I have to imagine he would have very much enjoyed knowing the impact that this simple exchange had on me and it's lasting effects.
Many years later, when I went to a show of his work after his passing, I saw all of his art in the shadow of that initial question. I see many things in the shadow of that initial question. It makes me smile.
Jeff Fox is a visual artist who works as graphic designer, trainer and multimedia consultant, but doesn't consider any of them real jobs. 
STAKEHOLDERS AND BLOODSUCKERS, 2001, enamel on paper, 66 x 101.6 cm, courtesy of the Marsters family, photo: David Barbour, © CARCC 2008. Adrian Göllner on Mark Marsters
Mark and I shared a studio in the Byward Market from 1987 to 1996. Amongst all of the good humour and bad puns, Mark’s amazing technical skill, social conscience and intolerance for all things pretentious were evident.
He produced all of this art at an astonishing rate. Every time I turned around in the studio, it seemed Mark had completed another work. One Saturday morning he called me over and showed me The Miraculous Annual Circumcision of St. Epidermous. I was gob-stopped: where had that come from and how could one artwork contain so many puns and still be so poignant?
Knowing he had fewer years than others, Mark held nothing back. Simultaneously trying to make a name for himself and provide for his family, he was willing to try any medium (short of oil on canvas) to put his ideas across. But despite amazing technical skills, a fountain-like imagination, and recognition amongst his peers, Mark’s art was outside the mainstream, and so galleries beyond Ottawa for the most part ignored him. In the early years of his career, Mark never acknowledged the darker themes in his work, preferring to emphasize its humorous aspects. But that was Mark: if there was something important to be said, he wasn’t going to bang you over the head with it and it was always best delivered with a laugh.
Only in the early years of a career can artists be as naïve, ambitious and boundlessly energetic as Mark and I were in those days. Even while enjoying the constant casual banter of the studio, I always had the sense that I would one day be trying to articulate something of his genius.
Adrian Göllner's text is adapted from his essay Thoughts on Mark from the catalog for Mark Marsters: Marsterpiece Theatre, the OAG exhibition co-curated by Göllner and Catherine Sinclair.
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