Born in New York in 1968, Marcus Jansen creates powerful paintings that respond to his experiences from growing up in the U.S. and Germany as well as cultural and social-political themes. His socially charged urban landscape paintings are influenced by the two opposite worlds he grew up in.
Through his colourful and expressive brushwork, Jansen documents the human condition critically, socially and politically and invites the viewer to engage in the reflection.
In 2012, Jansen launched a new series that he named ‘Faceless’. The series is a departure from Jansen’s post-apocalyptic dystopian urban environments. His work challenges the traditional stylised rules that have governed the genre and creates a new form of portraiture while investigating structures of power and anonymity.
Jansen had his first European solo museum exhibitions at La Triennale di Milano Museum, Milan and the Museum Zitadelle Berlin. He has participated in the 12th International Print and Drawing Biennial in Taiwan at the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Art. Works by Jansen are in collections of the Moscow Museum of Modern Art (MMOMA), The University of Michigan Museum of Art, The New Britain Museum of American Art, The Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, The National Taiwan Museum of Fine Art, The Housatonic Museum of Art and the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C.
Courtesy Almine Rech

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