Mars Lasar Synthesizes His Musical and Painting Careers

Australian-born composer-painter-synthesizer player Mars Lasar is being pulled in two directions. His new album, “Olympus,” is doing well on the charts, he’s got assorted commercial projects in the works, and he’s looking forward to a recording assignment with Herbie Hancock.

That may appear to be a full schedule, but Lasar has another career, as well--as a painter. On Sunday, “The Long Haul,” one of his large surreal Expressionist works, will be included in the National Parkinson Foundation’s annual celebrity auction.

“The thing that I really like about painting,” he says, “is that it’s so basic compared to the music that I do. When you’re working with synthesizers and computers to make sounds like Kraftwerk and Pink Floyd, it can be a very complicated, very technical process.

“But when you’re painting, it’s much more direct. I mean you could be dropped off on Easter Island, make your own brush and paints out of some plants and go paint on a rock. I love that idea--in fact, I just might go do it someday.”

Lasar came by his graphic skills naturally; his mother is an artist. But, at 28, he has spent most of his adult life in music.

He discovered synthesizers when he was 14, and within a few years had become staff composer for the company that produced the Fairlight Music Synthesizer--one of the first instruments that allowed a single performer to sound like an entire orchestra.

Despite their mechanical differences, Lasar feels a similarity between the creative urges that trigger his art and his music.

“They’re both linked together,” Lasar explains, “because they’re both in the mind’s eye. When I sit down to write music, I look into the mind and the music just comes out. And when I paint, even though I usually do a drawing or a rough sketch, it’s the same--I don’t really know what I’m going to do until I do it.”