Mark Oldland is an autistic adult who resides in Hillsborough, NJ with his wife and son, who also has autism spectrum disorder. As an artist, he strives to positively promote the abilities of autistic individuals by providing a window into their uniquely shared father/son perspective of the world. In doing so, his artwork is meant to encourage inclusion and educate the public about living life as an autistic person.
Mark began his art education at the Pennsylvania School of Art and Design in Lancaster, PA. Following two years of Fine Art Studies, he transferred to Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, MD, where he completed his undergraduate studies with a degree in General Fine Art in the Spring of 2000. Mark’s early works were heavily influenced by his fascination and interaction with moving water. As a result, his art career took a non-traditional turn when he enlisted in the United States Coast Guard in order to further his understanding of moving water. His service time included patrols on the Bering Sea and South Pacific while he continued to paint and draw the impacts of the environment he was observing. His experiences in the Coast Guard then unexpectedly led him to pursue a career with the Environmental Protection Agency in Emergency Response. This atypical path has pushed his artwork outward from his early comfort zone of analytical abstraction to explore his relationship with the representational world which, as an autistic individual, Mark finds abstract. This newfound range from one extreme to the other is the basis for his current art exploration, wherein he creates artwork to illustrate his “Spectrum” to the world. Through this work, he hopes to enlighten the public about the many abilities autistic people have to offer.