Alexandria Egypt – 1911 -2010
“Anything that pleases you is art – you make the choice. You shouldn’t be ashamed to like or to not like – you should only be ashamed of not understanding. There are not art movements, just a sensibility to the new possibilities in art.”
Marcel Salinas
Born in Alexandria, Egypt in 1911 of an Italian father and French mother, Salinas traveled extensively in his youth throughout the Mediterranean and frequently visited major museums and archeological sites. The elements of such visions were to eventually contribute to his growth as a painter. He studied painting with André L’hote, the French cubist theorist who so strongly influenced modern painting in the last century. The mature paintings and graphic works of Marcel Salinas reveal his careful studies of Paul Cezanne and the Provençal landscape – atmosphere, light, and the importance of geometric shapes permeate his works.
He does a kind of sorcerer’s cuisine with his thin fingers, using ancient formulas, and during this process a constant recitation goes on which covers the whole history of art from the cavemen to the present,” praised Ludwig Bemelmans, famous for his New Yorker cover illustrations, of his painting teacher, Salinas. Paralleling his life as a painter and a print a printmaker, Salinas has always been active as a counselor in the field of drawing, painting and graphic art. He has been artist-in-residence at the Foundation Drancois Desnoyer, Saint-Cyprien and Foundation of Paule Mikkelsen Minde Klarslov, Denmark.
As an artist, a printmaker, an adviser and an art consultant, Salinas has always strived to reach the highest quality possible in his artwork and in the field of editing and multiples. Working with both French and American ateliers, Salinas has been involved with artists of all aesthetic persuasions. This flexibility derives from the exceptional quality of his artistic education and his formal training. From 1969 to 1971, Salinas devoted much time to the creation of an important lithographic interpretation of 29 Portraits Imaginaires of Pablo Picasso for the publishers Cercle d’Art of Paris. So moved was Picasso by the interpretation of his paintings into lithography, he insisted that Salinas’ signature appear alongside his own on the completed lithograph editions.
Salinas’ first love is painting, which he continues to this day in residences in America and Belgium. Salinas has regularly exhibited in Paris at the Salon d’Automne, the Salondu Dessin et de la Peinture a L’eau and at the Grenier a Sel at Honfluer. His works are in collections in Egypt, Lebanon, Switzerland, Denmark, Great Britain, France, Japan and the United States, as well as in the Museum of Saint-Cyprien, the Bibliothé que Nationale of Paris and the Municipal Museum of Alexandria, Egypt.
