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Craig Marcus

Craig Marcus builds images through drawing and collage that begin without a plan and are shaped through repeated cycles of making and undoing. Marks accumulate freely at first, until patterns and structures start to surface. From there, the artwork shifts toward balance and reinforcement, strengthening shapes that prove themselves and dismantling those that do not.

Reduction is as important as construction. Shapes that feel forced are knocked back through erasure and removal. What disappears never vanishes completely. Traces remain. Scars, fragments, and partial structures stay embedded in the surface, creating a framework for the next phase of building. This cycle of emergence, refinement, and destruction can repeat many times within a single artwork.

Paper is cut, layered, and reworked until it carries both structure and memory. Drawing moves in and out of collage, sometimes clarifying spatial relationships, sometimes destabilizing them. Architectural suggestions, rhythm, and movement emerge slowly, then shift again. The image never fully settles. It stays active, holding evidence of its own history.

Narrative elements surface indirectly through this process, abstracted and veiled rather than illustrated. Meaning is not imposed. It accumulates through patience, pressure, and revision.

Craig Marcus received his BFA in Painting and Printmaking from Oberlin College in 1978. His career spans painting, graphic design, printmaking, software engineering, and furniture design and construction. These disciplines continue to inform his work through a sustained focus on composition, structure, and the intelligence of making. Marcus lives and works in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

portfolio.jpg View Craig Marcus' artwork in the 2026 exhibition Piecing It Together.

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