Born in Montreal in 1960, John F. Marok is a nationally recognized artist. A graduate of Concordia University in Montreal (1982), he specialized in painting and studied under such luminaries as Guido Molinari, John Fox and Tom Hopkins. He is the recipient of the Queen’s Golden Jubilee Medal (2002), as well as grants from the Canada Council and Quebec’s Ministère de la Culture. His work has been exhibited across the country and has been collected by several museums including le Musée du Québec, Musée d’art Contemporain in Montreal, Canada Council Art Bank in Ottawa, Calgary’s Nickel Arts Museum and the Agnes Etherington Arts Centre in Kingston. Marok’s paintings hang in many private collections, as well as in the collections of the University of Ottawa, the University of Quebec, McGill University, the City of Ottawa and the City of Gatineau. For the past 30 years, Marok has lived and worked in Wakefield, Quebec, a quaint little village in the Gatineau Hills, where he paints full-time.

“In my paintings, I channel my inner world and I explore and examine my relationship with the people, places and things around me. I weave personal experiences with my deep love and respect for art history, notably cubism and fauvism. I often depict narratives of love, reflections on solitude, childhood memories and my work is abound with historical cameos and references. I’d say the main protagonists are individuals, places and, even, objects, that are imbued with an enigmatic sense of self reflection. Being a Quebecker, I have been influenced by and one can see echoes of the great Quebec painters Alfred Pellan, Paul-Vanier Beaulieu and Jean Dallaire. More than mere references to their work however, my paintings are reflections of my own life. Each of my paintings take, as their inception, moments and memories from my life and I employ these as points of departure into my painting. The process of my paintings and how they unfold, results from much reworking. Brushes, rags and palette knives are the tools I employ in the service of my colours, lines, shapes and texture to give my subjects a heartbeat, a sense of vitality. An art-critic once said that my work seems to be a manifestation of my inner identity, of my true self. “That’s sounds likely”, I replied. “because when I finish a painting, it often seems to me a stranger or a place that I feel I’ve previously met or encountered. A feeling of familiarity, that sense of déjà-vu”.