JAVA.June.2018

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Mark Freedman and artist Lisa Von Hoffner
Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton is speaking to the crowd. He thanks Mark Freedman and Francesca Miller,
Freedman’s wife, for hosting this event at their home to raise money for his upcoming run for Congress.
Off to the side, Freedman shyly smiles and tries to deflect attention. After the speech ends, he graciously
gives me a tour of the house and his studio.
The architecture is beautiful, complete with high ceilings and an open concept space. The walls are impeccably
white, like a gallery, and are filled with edgy contemporary works of art. The party is going exceedingly well.
This mix of artists, collectors, business types, and political players seems strange at first, but Freedman sees
this kind of collaboration as essential if Phoenix is to reach its potential as a thriving art scene.
Freedman has had an interesting relationship with Arizona. He went to school in Tucson, twice. He garnered
success as a visual artist in Phoenix more than a decade ago, and then moved to New York for a decade. Now
he’s back, trying to make a life as an artist and more recently as a curator.
Mark Jay Freedman was born in Hollywood, California, and grew up in the San Fernando Valley. Although his
parents exposed him to culture at an early age and their trips to the original Getty Museum made an impact on
him, he didn’t necessarily gravitate toward art right away. Instead, he attended the University of Arizona and
earned a degree in Middle Eastern studies.
Freedman was fascinated with that part of the world and ended up in Haifa, Israel. “I really just wanted to be
an academic. I wanted to study and write theory,” he said. “I didn’t study religion. It was all real archaeological
and historical-based studies. I was really into that.” He worked at a museum that had both an antiquities
collection and a contemporary art gallery. “Somehow in Israel, between reading and working in the museum,
traveling, and being just completely on my own, I found the courage and the impulse to do art.”
Freedman returned to the States, then eventually back to the University of Arizona to study fine art. “My plan
was to go to art school to see if I liked it – if I was even good at anything,” he said. “It was all in my head, and
so I needed to put it to the test.” Art school was demanding for him, but his art practice developed enough that
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