Mark Garbarino, an American born in the 1960s, has succeeded through a 35-year career as a creator of sculptures, creature suits, puppets and prosthetic make-ups. After completing a bachelor degree in fine art at the University of South Florida, the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania born, Garbarino moved to New York City in 1983.
Early NYC job adventures included three years as one of 4 art directors at club AREA, building theme environments and performimg, and as a sculptor for the 1980s painter Kenny Scharf. 1987 Garbarino moved to LA and contributed puppets to such films as The Abyss, Nightmare on Elm Streets, Hot Shots 2, Virus, Hellraiser 4, and Bicentennial Man. His early career make-ups appeared on Madonna and Busta Rhymes in music videos, and Jim Carry in print work.
In the 1990s, as special make-up effects coordinator, the team won Emmy Awards for the television series Babylon 5 and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Individual Emmy nominations were honored in 1997 for Babylon 5, outstanding make-up for a series, and again in 2003 for prosthetics on Six Feet Under. Nominated in 2002 for the Local 706 Hair and Make-Up Awards, best prosthetics, transforming John Voight into Howard Cosell for ALI. Film make-ups highlights include character makeups seen in The Maze Runner: Scorch Trials, JJ Abraham's Star Trek 1 (Corporate Head Quarters) and Startrek 2, Pirates of the Caribbean 1 & 5, The Nutty Professor 2, Pearl Harbor, Artificial Intelligence. 2003 China film work began include Kung Fu Killer, Jackie Chan's age makeup in Forbidden Kingdom, Home Sweet Home (Karina Lam), Running on Karma and Kiddult, staring Andy Lau Tak-wa, Fearless, The Mad Detective, Warlords, Three Kingdoms Bodyguards and Assassins, Special ID, The Monkey King and Chasing the Dragon with actor Donnie Yen, and Possession Road. Three of these films were awarded Golden Lion Awards for best Costume/ Makeup. Garbarino also taught a make-up effects course at the Shanghai Theater Academy, November of 2004.
Mark Garbarino’s Funhouse continuies to be based in Los Angeles, with new highs of working on Guardians 3, The Kominski Method, Samaritan, Bones & All, and many other film and television series.