 | The topic of this article may not meet Wikipedia's notability guideline for biographies .(March 2011) |
Mark Velasquez | |
|---|---|
| Born | Santa Maria, California, United States |
| Occupation(s) | Fry cook, fine art photography |
Mark Velasquez is a photographer who competed on the first season of Bravo's reality television competition, Work of Art: The Next Great Artist .
Velasquez attended and was an altar boy at St. Mary of the Assumption School and St. Louis de Montfort School. He attended St. Joseph High School (Santa Maria, California) and Cornish College of the Arts (Seattle, Washington) where he studied drawing, sculpture and performance art. [1] Velasquez is an Eagle Scout and a member of the Elks. He has worked at his family's restaurant Tom's Take-Out since he was 14 years old in a variety of roles, most notably as a fry cook. He realized his love for photography after he began photographically documenting his own performance art pieces.
While Velasquez's imagery can be alluring and often features scantily clad women, he cites Norman Rockwell as his primary inspiration. "Rockwell used people from his small town, his friends, neighbors, children ... making art from what you have around you." [2]
In August 2009 Velasquez participated in the Los Angeles, California open casting call for Bravo TV's art-themed reality television program Work of Art: The Next Great Artist. He was selected to be a contestant and competed on the program for 8 of 10 episodes until being voted off during episode 8: Opposites Attract, a Heaven and Hell-themed collaborative challenge with co-contestant Peregrine Honig. Honig wanted to depict hell through Velasquez's abdominal scar, a visual record of his bout with diverticulitis. While Mark initially fought back, saying that he didn't feel that the scar represented hell, he eventually acquiesced. The judges found the concept "uninspiring and clichéd." Host China Chow notably "fought back tears" while announcing the judges' decision that Velasquez would not continue. [3]
May 2010 marked the publication of Show & Tell, an 80-page hard-cover book collecting Velasquez's photographs of six models who represent milestones in his early career. The book includes ruminations on his experiences and relationships with each model and how both have changed over the course of their friendships. [4]
In November 2010 Velasquez launched NSFW magazine with collaborator Michael Neff. NSFW , an acronym for Not Safe For Work, is a quarterly publication. Each issue is centered on a theme and features photographs and writings by Velasquez, a column written by Hilary Underwood, and photographs of model Kacie Marie.
The Price Is Right is an American television game show where contestants compete by guessing the prices of merchandise to win cash and prizes. A 1972 revival by Mark Goodson and Bill Todman of their 1956–1965 show of the same name, the new version added many distinctive gameplay elements. Contestants are selected from the studio audience. When the announcer calls their name, they use the show's famous catchphrase, "Come on down!"
Stéphane Sednaoui is a French music video director, photographer, film producer and actor. He has worked in various forms of media, including music videos, photojournalism, portrait photography, fashion and pop culture.
Project Runway is an American reality television series that premiered on Bravo on December 1, 2004. The series focuses on fashion design. It was created by Eli Holzman and was hosted by Heidi Klum from 2004 to 2017. It has a varied airing history, with Bravo originating the first five seasons, followed by Lifetime for eleven more. The show has had over 30 international adaptations.
Manuel Álvarez Bravo was a Mexican artistic photographer and one of the most important figures in 20th century Latin American photography. He was born and raised in Mexico City. While he took art classes at the Academy of San Carlos, his photography is self-taught. His career spanned from the late 1920s to the 1990s with its artistic peak between the 1920s and 1950s. His hallmark as a photographer was to capture images of the ordinary but in ironic or Surrealistic ways. His early work was based on European influences, but he was soon influenced by the Mexican muralism movement and the general cultural and political push at the time to redefine Mexican identity. He rejected the picturesque, employing elements to avoid stereotyping. He had numerous exhibitions of his work, worked in the Mexican cinema and established Fondo Editorial de la Plástica Mexicana publishing house. He won numerous awards for his work, mostly after 1970. His work was recognized by the UNESCO Memory of the World registry in 2017.
China Eiko Chow is a British-born American actress and model.
Blind Date is an American dating game show. The show was originally hosted by Roger Lodge, and is currently hosted by Nikki Glaser.
Lola Álvarez Bravo was the first Mexican female photographer and a key figure in the post-revolution Mexican renaissance. Known for her high level of skill in composition, her works were seen by her peers as fine art. She was recognized in 1964 with the Premio José Clemente Orozco, by the State of Jalisco, for her contributions to photography and her efforts to preserve the culture of Mexico. Her works are included in the permanent collections of international museums, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.
Charles William Wikle is an American actor and reality television personality best known for his appearance in the fifth American season of Big Brother. He was an openly gay contestant on the reality series.
Shear Genius is an American reality television series on the Bravo network that focuses on hair styling. The show ran for three seasons, from April 2007 to April 2010. It was hosted by actress Jaclyn Smith in seasons one and two and by Brazilian model Camila Alves for season three.
Ralph John Perou, known professionally as Perou and @mrperou on social media, is a British fashion, portrait and music photographer who has also appeared as a judge on Make Me a Supermodel UK and on season 2 of Bravo TV's American Make Me a Supermodel. He was part of the T.V series called "Dirty Sexy Things" on the British network E4 which aired in 2011. Perou photographed models to be put in his exhibition at the end of the series.
Whitney Lee Thompson Forrester is an American plus-size model and is the winner of the tenth cycle of America's Next Top Model.
Hell's Kitchen is an American reality competition cooking show that premiered on Fox on May 30, 2005. The series is hosted by celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay, who created and appeared in the British series of the same name. Each season, two teams of chefs compete for a job as head chef at a restaurant, while working in the kitchen of a restaurant set up in the television studio.
Remo Camerota, is an English-Australian visual artist and film director. He has been exhibiting in the arts since 1992, when he also started a fine art degree at Swinburne University, Melbourne.
Season 1 of Make Me a Supermodel, an American reality television series based on the British series of the same name, premiered on January 10, 2008, on the Bravo television network.
The Fashion Show: Ultimate Collection is an American reality television series that premiered on May 7, 2009, on the Bravo cable network. The show focuses on fashion design and features hosts fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi and supermodel Iman. The contestants compete against each other to create the best clothes. They are restricted in time, materials, and theme; the resulting designs are judged and one or more designers is eliminated each week. The show was originally co-hosted by singer Kelly Rowland; she was replaced by Iman in Season 2.
Sandhurst Tacama Miggins, is a Tobagonian fashion model best known as a contestant and first runner-up of the second season of the show Make Me a Supermodel.
Gary Mark Smith is an American street photographer. Smith is noted for his pioneering global range and his empathetic and literal style of photography sometimes captured in extremely hazardous circumstances.
J Henry Fair is an American photographer, environmental activist, and co-founder of the Wolf Conservation Center in South Salem, New York. Born in Charleston, South Carolina, he currently lives and works in New York City.
Mike Vensel is an American artist, photographer and fashion designer. His works explore ideas of simplicity, structure, fluidity, nature and form in various mediums including painting, drawing, sculpture, photography, video art, digital art, performance art and fashion design. Throughout all of his creative endeavors he maintains a sleek, sexy minimalist ecstatic that transcends the various mediums.
Peregrine Honig is an American artist. Honig's work is concerned with the relationship between pop culture, sexual vulnerability, social anxieties, the ethics of luxury, and trends in consumerism.
