Existentialism and postmodernism have been central concerns within Carmen Marin’s semi-figurative paintings, executed since 2020. Extensively informed by the visual vocabularies of such modernist and contemporary masters as Paul Cézanne, Edvard Munch, Joan Mitchell, Georg Baselitz and Kiki Smith, Marin approaches each one of her canvases as a primordial undertaking in addressing vision, visuality and the human condition.
Having established a distinct pictorial grammar through which to experiment, Marin has stated: “I think it’s absurd to say that illusion and abstraction are the same. Yet I believe there is truth in absurdity.”
“Facing every blank canvas, I attempt to reinvent myself,” reflects Marin. “There will always be continuities with and breaks from the past, just as a given present moment always remains somehow attached to the immediate past and immediate future.”
