For as long as Mark Weber can remember, he’s been interested in art.

The Wilmington-based artist and illustrator has been in the art business since 1982 when he started as a freelance illustrator with his local newspaper. Since then, his creations have been featured in The New York Times, Rolling Stone, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Playboy and more.

“I was the kid in grade school who basically sat in the back and drew,” said Weber (who also produces illustrations for the Business Journal). “I’ve always been in art. I think it’s the one thing in my life that I almost felt predetermined I was going to do. It just came real natural to me. I always had a love for it."

As far as Weber’s “breakthrough” as an artist, that would be a project he completed 17 years into his career as an illustrator.

“There have been many projects over the years but the one that really helped me break through the market was a portrait I did of (rapper) Ol’ Dirty Bastard for Rolling Stone magazine for their record review, which was in the October 1999 issue,” Weber said.

Before getting his start in art, Weber was born and raised in Erie, Pennsylvania. He relocated to New Jersey, then moved to Wilmington 10 years later in 2010 with his wife.

“We vacationed in the Outer Banks every summer and fell in love with North Carolina,” Weber said. “Then our daughter decided to attend UNCW in 2008, and once we started visiting her, we were hooked on Wilmington.”

Until 2014, Weber had only ever used his homes as art studios. That changed when he found ACME Art Studios in the Brooklyn Art District on North 5th Avenue.

“I started painting more and I knew I wanted to paint bigger, so that’s what led me to ACME Art Studios,” Weber said. “That really did open a lot of doors for me locally here in Wilmington. Since that time, I’ve just been painting and illustrating.”

Weber was largely inspired to establish his studio outside his home because of his expanding work with painting.
 
“I think a lot of it came down to painting, just for that factor,” he said. “When illustrating for years, I worked fairly small, maybe 24 inches at the most. Then I really felt like branching out and working large, and I knew I couldn’t do it. I really needed to get space, and that’s when I found ACME. It was one of those things – I knew about it, and I always wanted to go down there, but things kept popping up. And one day, me and a friend were walking downtown, and there it was. I went to pop in, and next thing I know, I’m renting space.” 

Weber’s move to the South and nature have greatly influenced his work. His many trips to the Outer Banks, visiting his daughter at the University of North Carolina Wilmington and moving to Wilmington are documented throughout his work. He’s widely known for his vibrant paintings depicting whimsical animals in lush, tropical settings. He’s also known and recognized for his pieces rendered in ink and wash.

Over the years, he’s illustrated children’s books, including Little Toot and the Lighthouse, The Pirate Princess and Paul Bunyan.

Most recently, Weber has taken a renewed interest in drawing and painting from life and is embracing the act of painting plein air. According to Merriam-Webster, plein air is a 19th-century style of painting that quite literally means painting outdoors in the fresh air and a “branch of impressionism that attempts to represent outdoor light and air.”

“You work so much from your imagination, especially in children’s books and even in my editorial work, I have to come up with ideas, different slants and everything,” Weber said. “Sometimes it’s great to just go outside and just look at something and draw it.”

Fresh air and experiencing the outdoors are also significant influences in Weber’s art and how he keeps his artwork new and exciting. His advice to other artists is to go outside and experience the outdoors and see what sparks inspiration.

“I’ll be honest, being out in the fresh air this time of year is not fun,” he said. “I rarely go out in this heat. As soon as the weather gets cooler, it’s just nice to get out there. It’s invigorating. You get to move around more, and you’re not stuck behind a drawing board or easel. You’re in fresh air. I just think it’s something every artist should do.”

As Weber transitioned to doing more children’s book illustrations, he described balancing his lighter and darker palettes, which punctuate his mature themes.

“By doing this different body of work, I’m not going to take that to the same people who are publishing light and fluffy works about rabbits or whatever,” Weber said. “I’m going to take that to a different publisher. It just comes from knowing the market. You have to go to bookstores; you have to read magazines and see what’s in the magazines, what kind of art they are using. It gets a little hard sometimes when you’re working a couple different styles because you have to market it differently. You can’t just put out a blanket marketing and hope everyone is going to come see it.”

Because art is his business, Weber has had to change and evolve as the market does. He largely saw this over the years as outlets shifted from sending work via FedEx and illustrations to everything transported as computer files. He also had to learn some Photoshop skills as Photoshop gained popularity and has had to learn the different social media platforms as they have risen in popularity as a way to showcase his work and illustrations.

“There’s so many platforms now,” Weber said. “I think the best thing you can do is keep producing work and getting that in front of people as much as you can."

As Weber looks to the future, he plans to continue going to his studio daily and get back into his brush and ink work.

“It’s been a journey,” he said, “and it just gets more interesting.”