ABOUT
Having grown-up in the Boulevard Housing Projects in East New York, Brooklyn, Marc attended Thomas Jefferson High School, and later studied Sociology at Brooklyn College. He trained as an Orientation and Mobility Instructor for the Blind but spent the greater part of his working life in administrative positions in the labor movement. After college, Marc began to make art. He rejected a formal art education preferring instead to struggle alone toward a realization of his own creative vision. Working "high and low", Marc uses humor, irony and paradox to reference existential questions, and issues regarding art, language and contemporary social problems. His subjects range from the Ladino proverbs of the Sephardic Jews to the complexities and absurdities of modern life.
Marc is the author of Traces of Sepharad (Huellas de Sefarad), Etchings of Judeo-Spanish Proverbs. Artist Books, include: But a Bubble; Man, A Machine of Absurdities; Signs; Cheap Gems, Precious Stones; Prometheus’ Gifts; White Rose; Luna Park; Prints and Poets; The Orestia Trilogy; Message from the Memoirist, Poems by Paul Pines, published by Dos Madres Press. In 2008 Marc founded Gravity Free Press to show, publish and distribute his artwork, books, broadsides, and to serve as a platform for collaborative projects with other artists, especially writers and poets.
Visit the Studio
If you would like to arrange a visit to Marc's studio in New York City, please get in touch.
Solo Shows
Postcard Art. NYPL Hudson Branch. 2023.
Introduction to the Artist Book, NYPL Hudson Park Library, 2022.
Imagining the Artist Book. White Plains Public Library, December 2021 - February 2022.
Imagining the Artist Book. NYPL Virtual Retrospective Exhibition. June, 2021.
Luna Park: A Topsy-Turvy World, NYPL Hudson Park Library, New York, NY 2019
Marc Shanker, Recent Paintings, Upper Manhattan Arts Stroll - Cafe Buunni, 2019
Sacco and Vanzetti, Judson Memorial, 12th Anarchist Art Festival and Bookfair, 2018
Traces of Sepharad, Addison-Penzak Jewish Community Center of Silicon Valley,
Los Gatos, CA 2017Traces of Sepharad, Osher Marin JCC | Center for Jewish Peoplehood, San Rafael, CA 2017
Luna Park, Artspace. Hudson Falls, NY 2016
Traces of Sepharad, New York Public Library, Inwood, New York, NY 2016
Traces of Sepharad, Elting Memorial Library, New Paltz, NY 2014
Remembering Sacco and Vanzetti, Word Up, New York, NY 2014
Holocaust Series, Jewish Currents Magazine Online Gallery 2014
Musings… Artspace, Hudson Falls, NY 2014
Traces of Sepharad, Daglicht Print Center, Eindhoven, Netherlands 2009
Traces of Sepharad, New Haven Jewish Center, New Haven, CN 2009
Traces of Sepharad, Center for Jewish History, New York, NY 2008 - 2009
Creative Quandries, Uptown Gallery, Kingston, NY 2004
Abstractions, Jadite Gallery, New York, NY 1991
Group Shows
New Paintings, Atwater Gallery, Rhinebeck, NY 2015
Outsider Artists, Atwater Gallery, Rhinebeck, NY 2014
Traces of Silence, juried show, Manhattan Graphics Center, New York, NY 2013
Unbounded, juried show, Prague, Czech Republic 2013
Art & Friends, Deutsches Haus, New York, NY 2011
Small Works, juried show, Washington Square East Gallery, New York, NY 2004
Times of War, Signs of Peace, Martin Luther King Center, New York, NY 2003
Peace Show, Kentler International Drawing Center, New York, NY 2002
Contemporary Collage Now, juried show, Nexus Gallery, New York, NY 2001
Small Works, Juror: Peter Blum, Washington Square East Gallery, New York, NY 2001
Glue, Annual Exhibit of Collage/Assemblage Society,
New Century Artists, New York, NY 2001
Books
Pointless 2024
ubu rex 2023
Meditations on Humpty Dumpty 2022
Disorder 2022
Proletarians 2022
Bloody Traps 2022
Steal the Cheese 2022
“Marc Shanker’s Library of Small Books” 2018-2021.
100+ unique editions, 12 pages, 6” x 5,” Drawings, prints, collage.
Who Me? Yes You. artist book, Gravity Free Press, 2021.
The End of the Beginning, Unique edition artist book, Gravity Free Press, 2020.
BACH, Unique edition artist book, Gravity Free Press, 2020.
Bring Me a Toothpick…Homo Absurdus. Unique edition artist book, Gravity Free Press, 2020.
Looking Into The Eye of Doom: The Diary of a Greek Soldier in Troy, Unique edition artist book, Gravity Free Press, 2020.
Oresteia Trilogy, Aeschylus. artist books, Gravity Free Press.
Agamemnon, 2013.
Libation Bearers, 2018.
Eumenides, 2019.
Prints into Poetry, poems by Antonio Muñoz Molina, Susan Sherman, Robert Murphy,
David M. Katz, David Giannini, Gravity Free Press, 2018.
White Rose, Gravity Free Press, 2018.
Signs, artist book, Gravity Free Press, 2017.
Cheap Gems, Precious Rocks, artist book, Gravity Free Press, 2016.
Luna Park, Gravity Free Press, 2016
Message from the Memorist, poems by Paul Pines, Dos Madres Press 2015
Prometheus’ Gifts, artist book, Gravity Free Press, 2013.
But a Bubble, artist book, Gravity Free Press, 2011.
Man, A Machine of Absurdities, artist book, Gravity Free Press, 2011.
Traces of Sepharad (Huellas de Sefarad): Etchings of Judeo-Spanish Proverbs,
Essays by Antonio Muñoz Molina & T.A. Perry, Gravity Free Press, 2008.Commissions
ALTE, #8. 2021.
Last Call, A Collaborative Oratorio. CD Cover. Music: Catherine Reid, Words: Paul Pines. 2021.
Café Review, cover & centerfold 2015, 2017
Jewish Currents, illustrations 2009, 2011- 2013
Jewish Currents, cover & centerfold 2010
Jews Calendar, illustrations 2000-2001
Jews, Chosen Words and Images, cover & illustrations, Issues #1, 2, 3, 7, 8 1999-2002
Dull Doll, poem by Esther Cohen, illustrations & calligraphy, 1999.
Mulch #5. Chaim Soutine, Paintings. Exhibition review, Fall 1974.
Collaborations
Mr. Beller’s Neighborhood, essay by Renee Shanker, 2021.
In a Moment We May Be Strangely Blended, poems by David Giannini, Dos Madres Press, 2019.
Prints and Poets, artist book, Gravity Free Press, 2018.
Broadside: The Tears of Things, poem by Susan Sherman, 2018.
Broadside: The Brooklyn Dodgers, poem by Paul Pines, 2017.
Fisher King, Paul Pines. Chiron Publications, 2017.
Broadside: Luna Park, 2016.
Message From the Memoirist, poems by Paul Pines, Dos Madres Press, 2015.
Spring, poems by Harry Lewis. Two & Two Press. 1975.
Brooklyn Bridge, poem by Mayakovsky, translated by Harry Lewis. Broadway Boogie Press, 1974.
Articles & Reviews
The New York Times, Metropolitan Diary.. My Favorite Painting (Juan de Pareja) my, 2023.
American Book Review: Time, Lost and Found 2015
Manhattan Times,
The Parlance of Protest, El Lenguaje de la Protesta, Sacco and Vanzetti 2014Sephardic Horizons, Traces of Sepharad: An Introduction 2011
Jewish Currents, Traces of Sepharad, A Family’s Ladino Proverbs,
cover, etchings & feature article 2010Turk of America 2009
Poughkeepsie Journal; Sunday Record 2004
Radio & Television
Radio Sefarad, Madrid, interview 2010
Mel Berkowitz Presents (Channel 67), lecture 2009
Lectures & Talks
Luna Park, a Topsy-Turvy World, NYPL Hudson Park Library, New York, NY 2019
Sacco and Vanzetti: The Letters, Judson Memorial Church
Louis and Mildred Resnick Lecture Series, NYS College at New Paltz, NY 2014
Union Synagogue, Brooklyn, NY 2012
Sephardic Horizons, Washington, DC 2011
Center for Jewish History, New York, NY 2009
JCC New Haven, CT 2009
Instituto Cervantes, New York, NY 2009
Teaching
Shakespeare’s Plays, 1199 SEIU, New York, NY 2005-2019.