San Francisco born, Inglewood based contemporary artist Marie-Jose began painting in 2016, employing surrealism as a tool for inspiring a previously indiscernible future and occasionally reimagining the past. Along with painting, collage & mixed media are the vehicles for exploring the multiplicity of the Black femme experience. Influenced by artists such as Salvador Dali, Kerry James Marshall, and the artists’ Nigerian heritage, many scenes offer Black figures among dreamlike cloudscapes and thematic metaphors that refer to the intricacy of life, the consequence of introspection, and feelings of vulnerability, hope, and courage. Naming their style as ‘Afro-Surrealistic’, the work reexamines the barriers of Black liberation. Marie-Jose has participated in numerous art markets and festivals nationwide, and had paintings in the Affordable Art Fair in New York and Aqua Art Miami in Miami Beach in 2022. They have shown work with the LA LGBT Center and the Museum of Science + Industry in Chicago. They were also a recent 2022 Artist in Residence participant in Fukuoka, Japan and made their international debut with an exhibition with Studio Kura.

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