Marcus Jansen, "Two Decades of Relevance," 2021. Installation at The Baker Museum, Naples, FL.
Marcus Jansen was born 1968 in Manhattan, New York City and first resided with his family in the Bronx. He later moved to Queens where he started school in the 1970’s and painted a lion at age six that was selected to be exhibited at the Lever House in Manhattan which became Jansen's first public exhibition. His family later moved to Moenchengladbach Germany, where he received a German education and grew up bilingual.
Jansen’s unique artistic vocabulary was discovered by the former Museum Director of the American Vanguard Exhibitions Europe 1961, Jerome A. Donson; who wrote about Jansen’s work as being "reminiscent of the Ash-Can School,” and named him the “innovator of modern expressionism.”.
While showing in Munich, the home of the German Expressionists painters’ movement, Jansen, was noted as “one of the most important American painters of his generation” by the only two-time Documenta Kassel Curator and German Art Historian, Prof. Dr. Manfred Schneckenburger.
Inspired by the rebellious art form of graffiti from his native Bronx and Manhattan in the early 1970’s and later again in the early 1980’s on his return visits when he met some of the cities second-generation graffiti art pioneers, the movement became a catalyst for Jansen in the 1990’s, advancing a new generation into socially charged urban landscape paintings.
Jansen was influenced by the two very different worlds he grew up in and it’s this contrast that helped mold him into one of a handful of international leading combatants of the avant-garde. His paintings are often situated between contemporary and street or graffiti art elements that explore and document the human condition critically, socially and politically.
Jansen’s international public collections include The Bronx Museum of the Arts, The Xiao Museum of Contemporary Art, The Moscow Museum of Modern Art (MMOMA), The New Britain Museum of American Art, The Rollins Museum of Art, The PERMM Museum of Contemporary 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 DC.
Jansen’s first art documentary was filmed in 2016 titled, “Marcus Jansen Examine and Report” filmed by Emmy award-winning filmmaker John Scoular which chronicles his humble beginnings in 1999 selling his art on street corners between Prince Street and Broadway in New York City as part of a group of artists referred to as “prince street kings.”
In 2019, the artist opened the Marcus Jansen Foundation Fund and focuses on assisting marginalized community art organizations seeking to provide exposure to less economically advantaged. The Fund also aims to support organizations that assist veterans diagnosed with PTSD as well as Autism causes seeking art and or music as a way to express in a post Hurrican Ian era. The Foundation Fund is part of the Collaboratory in Fort Myers, Florida. Mr.Jansen works from Fort Myers Florida and Bronx, New York.
Jansen’s unique artistic vocabulary was discovered by the former Museum Director of the American Vanguard Exhibitions Europe 1961, Jerome A. Donson; who wrote about Jansen’s work as being "reminiscent of the Ash-Can School,” and named him the “innovator of modern expressionism.”.
While showing in Munich, the home of the German Expressionists painters’ movement, Jansen, was noted as “one of the most important American painters of his generation” by the only two-time Documenta Kassel Curator and German Art Historian, Prof. Dr. Manfred Schneckenburger.
Inspired by the rebellious art form of graffiti from his native Bronx and Manhattan in the early 1970’s and later again in the early 1980’s on his return visits when he met some of the cities second-generation graffiti art pioneers, the movement became a catalyst for Jansen in the 1990’s, advancing a new generation into socially charged urban landscape paintings.
Jansen was influenced by the two very different worlds he grew up in and it’s this contrast that helped mold him into one of a handful of international leading combatants of the avant-garde. His paintings are often situated between contemporary and street or graffiti art elements that explore and document the human condition critically, socially and politically.
Jansen’s international public collections include The Bronx Museum of the Arts, The Xiao Museum of Contemporary Art, The Moscow Museum of Modern Art (MMOMA), The New Britain Museum of American Art, The Rollins Museum of Art, The PERMM Museum of Contemporary 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 DC.
Jansen’s first art documentary was filmed in 2016 titled, “Marcus Jansen Examine and Report” filmed by Emmy award-winning filmmaker John Scoular which chronicles his humble beginnings in 1999 selling his art on street corners between Prince Street and Broadway in New York City as part of a group of artists referred to as “prince street kings.”
In 2019, the artist opened the Marcus Jansen Foundation Fund and focuses on assisting marginalized community art organizations seeking to provide exposure to less economically advantaged. The Fund also aims to support organizations that assist veterans diagnosed with PTSD as well as Autism causes seeking art and or music as a way to express in a post Hurrican Ian era. The Foundation Fund is part of the Collaboratory in Fort Myers, Florida. Mr.Jansen works from Fort Myers Florida and Bronx, New York.