Approaching one of Marcus Jansen’s canvasses is like getting your bearings after having your brain rattled by a near explosion.
The chaotic colorful strokes that make up the landscape, the dominant force in any Jansen work, lends itself to momentary squints of confusion. It’s only when the viewer latches onto some familiar object—a hand, a ball, a butterfly, a Dalmatian—that they begin to piece together the work. It’s only then you realize that what you’re seeing isn’t some surreal fever dream, but rather a frenzied form of real-life documentation trying to make sense of the world.
This act of documentation is vital to understanding Jansen’s work. In the film, Marcus Jansen Examine and Report, by Emmy Award winning filmmaker John Scoular, the artist is quoted as saying, “painting is the most intimate act of war.” It’s a point-of-view born out of his years serving with the U.S. Armed Forces, including a tour in Operation Desert Storm. Jansen’s art is a way for him to investigate the world around him, cohere it into a presentation, and exhibit the facts of the situation to the audience. Jansen, born 1968 in Manhattan, New York, was first inspired in his teen years by New York graffiti artist WEST Rubinstein, aka WEST ONE after an introduction of the two. This influence is evident even today in Jansen’s work.
Jansen is currently on tour in Germany and Austria, and his exhibit entitled Obscure Line Between Fact and Fiction is now on display at The Weinstein Gallery in San Francisco.
Q&A
MAJ: What is your process?
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