Mariska Karto

Mariska Karto is a fine art photographer born in Suriname and raised in the Netherlands. The breadth of her oeuvre is a masterful homage to Classicism in art history. Her multidisciplinary skill as a figurative sketcher draws a connection to the meditative practises of Renaissance draughtsmen like Leonardo, and her knowledge of fabrics as a textile artist is comparable to the dexterity of Ingres and Titian. However it is Karto’s mastery of contemporary photography that leads viewers to witness realistic images compelled by classical tradition.

For The Public House of Art, Karto has created a tensely, seductive and dramatic two-part series. Her sensual portraits depict the beauty of the female form; soft, glowing skin that venerates these women as cult icons. She conjures up an environment of lushly draped fabrics, fashioning an aura that is supple, but charged by a feminine mystique and strength.

Mariska Karto’s Frescoes, such as ‘Cult of Consumption’, pinnacle her exhausting craft with each element individually photographed by the artist. It’s an eruption of artistic expression, echoed by a visual intensity that is fraught with chaos, melancholy, death, love, and sacrifice, taking over a year to develop. Karto utilises her art to illustrate the harsh realities that effect contemporary society. By placing the viewer outside the framework of her frescoes, a humanistic perspective is illuminated, and Karto incites a contemporary didacticism that’s impossible to ignore.

Karto has impressed collectors and establishments around the world, and garnered a faithful following. Her wild success is consistently documented by prize competitions across the globe; most recently she was awarded First Prize Gold Award at the Prix De La Photographie De Paris in 2016.