By James Lomuscio
With a lens for a brush and the world his palette, Westporter Mark Molesworth doesn’t settle for the prosaic or even standard artistry with his camera.
Mark and Donna Molesworth at their Westport home. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) James Lomuscio for WestportNow.com
“I like looking for impact,” says Molesworth, an award-winning cinematographer as well as an award-winning WestportNow.com contributing photographer.
“You want to take the (audience) and focus their eye,” he added. ”You want to wow them.”
As a still photographer, it is not enough for Molesworth to capture a seagull in fight at Compo Beach, “but where the angle of the wing is right, getting the water dripping off the beak.”
The same holds true for other overlooked details, be it a wave crashing, a fisherman casting, a flower. The photos pull the viewers in and hold them.
Molesworth draws inspiration while tooling around town in his light green Vespa scooter, exploring Compo, Longshore Club Park, Burying Hill Beach, the Partrick Wetlands and myriad open spaces.
He uncovers images in plain sight, a finch at a bird feeder, morning dew on a cobweb, “sometimes using close-ups, sometimes using wide angles,” he says.
Others he has to unearth or scour for, such as the intact 1800s tavern pipe and early 1900s inkwell he found along the banks of the Saugatuck River. He even unearthed a 100-year-old perfume bottle, the glass top sealed so well, it was half full.
“You can still smell the perfume,” he said. “In the garage I must have a box with 60 pounds of things I’ve found.”
Using his mind’s eye, Molesworth employs that same “wow effect” with his feature documentaries. Among them are; “Silk Road: Drugs, Death and the Dark Web,” “Jimi Hendrix and the Isle of Wright,” and “Dick Smith Make Up Artist,” which earned him a CINE Golden Eagle award.
Molesworth and his wife Donna Bertaccini own Molesworth Enterprises, Inc., a New York City-based film and television production company. It has worldwide clients, many of them based in the UK, a lot of his work for the BBC.
Recently his latest documentary, a BBC arts film titled “Basquiat: Rage to Riches,” won the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) award.
The film directed by David Schulman choreographs the work of modern artist Jean-Michel Basquait, a celebrated graffiti artist who was known for his vibrant colors and lived to be only 27. Molesworth’s film beat out David Attenborough’s entry “Blue Planet.” (It can br viewed streaming online HERE.)
“With cinematography you’re thinking about mood and lighting,” said Molesworth. “With still photography you’re aware of that, but you’re capturing a moment in time.”
Moleworth seems to maneuver seamlessly between the two visual media. His love for capturing images was forged at 14 when his brother Greg, serving in Vietnam, “sent me my first camera, a Yashika 35mm that he bought at the PX.”
Molesworth said he never wanted a desk job like his father who owned a New York City public relations firm.
Being tied to a desk is the last thing the New York University film school graduate would experience.
Cinematography jobs have been worldwide, everywhere from Camp David during the George W. Bush Administration to Easter Island and Peru to the Falkland Islands and to Haiti alongside the late news anchor Peter Jennings.
Always in motion, Molesworth in two hours today had an assignment closer to home, Westchester, New York, to film a documentary on Academy Award-winning actor Michael Douglas. When told that Douglas had grown up in Westport, Molesworth agreed it would be a good icebreaker.
Mark Molesworth shows off some Westport artifacts he found. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) James Lomuscio for WestportNow.com
And when he gets back home, while it’s still light, Molesworth will pursue his other passion as he heads out on his Vespa, his long-lens camera in the compartment under the scooter’s seat.
“I love nature, and I don’t mind being in the quiet,” he said. “You lose the sense that you’re in suburbia.”
