Marilyn, 2008

Marcos Marin  

Marcos Marin was born in Brazil in 1967 and seemed destined to explore a life of creativity. At an early age, Marcos showed an interest in music and began taking classical piano lessons at the Music Conservatory in São Paulo. Eventually, his studies brought him to France, where he began to seek a new outlet for his creativity: painting.

Marcos blends the figurative and the abstract into ingenious optical illusions that reach new dimensions. Known for using grids, pixilation and inventive lines to reveal portraits of celebrities and political figures from Marilyn Monroe to President Obama, he speaks for a generation by producing work that is a testament to our fame-hungry times. “My paintings do not define a time, but perpetuate a moment of glory that brings about an enchanted perspective," says Marcos.

At the beginning of the new millennium, Marcos moved to the United States where his career as an artist gained momentum. In 2003, his first sculpture was displayed at the Arte Americas art fair. Only a year later in 2004, during Art Basel he was invited by Delphine Pastor to come to Monaco, where he now lives, and exhibit his work there. Over the next several years, he was commissioned to paint the portrait of Grace of Monaco for the Nouveau Musée de Monaco and to create a public monument to Prince Rainier III, which stands at the entrance to the Fontvieille Circus. His work has been exhibited in galleries and museums from Moscow to California. He remains one of the most influential artists of his generation and, at fifty years of age, is in his artistic prime, continuing to masterfully walk the line between op art and pop art.