Liz Markus Featured at Museum of Contemporary Art of Marseille

Liz Markus Featured at Museum of Contemporary Art of Marseille
Showcasing the artist’s work in the group show Climatic Life

We are thrilled to celebrate ART FOR CHANGE artist Liz Markus, featured in Climatic Life: Sensitive Histories from Private Collections at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Marseille and ADIAF. The exhibition is part of the 8th De leur temps Triennial, highlighting recent acquisitions by collectors supporting contemporary art.

Bringing together 136 works from over 70 collections, Climatic Life explores art collections as living ecosystems and questions the idea of the museum as a stable, controlled environment in the face of today’s ecological, political, and social changes.

Markus’ painting Mockingbird is part of her cheeseburger series from 2023. The cheeseburgers are abstract, floating compositions made of layered, vibrant colors separated by thin white lines. Their scale is ambiguous, either cosmic or microscopic, and they don’t look edible but are visually satisfying. As the colors blend and shift, they create new forms, resembling dreamy, sunset-like patterns.

Her ART FOR CHANGE limited edition print, Giant Green TRex, shares a similar playful nuance with Mockingbird. Across both works, Markus uses layered color to conceptualize the whimsy in her practice.

Preview her limited edition print Giant Green TRex below.

Liz Markus, Giant Green TRex

LIZ MARKUS
Giant Green TRex
24 x 20 inches
Archival pigment print 

Limited Edition of 40 with 5 AP
Signed and numbered by the artist

Limited Edition of 30
Hand-embellished, signed, and numbered by the artist

Giant Green TRex is an expressive print exemplary of Markus’ practice and the all-consuming process of energetic color. The whimsical, verdant figure flows toward the edge of the print with a spiraling eye and scream reverberating up and out of the work. 

 The artist explores her ideas of origin and freedom through her series of TRex paintings and other points of interest, where her intuitive approach becomes palpable in the movement and freedom of her marks. 

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Liz Markus paints the subjects that captivate her, often developing multiple, interconnected series at the same time. Growing up as a Gen Xer, her work is shaped by the raw energy of punk and grunge culture, infusing her art with an irreverent, visceral edge. Her intuitive process is fueled by recurring fascinations—dinosaurs, hippies, cavemen, socialites, witches, monsters, and fashion. Markus explores the tension between psychological repression and liberation, believing that the non-verbal mind produces the most compelling paintings. She approaches her work as a conversation with the subconscious, allowing instinct and imagination to guide the brush. Markus applies bold, colorful washes of acrylic paint, often on unprimed canvas, creating works that feel both spontaneous and deliberate. Her artistic vision was shaped by formative years spent at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, NY, absorbing the power of Abstract Expressionists, Stain Painters, and Pop Artists whose work dominates the museum’s collection.