“The DNA of my art is the 90s and the 0s, a once analogue world and the digital revolution. I’m fascinated by the design of videogame designs, the aesthetics of music videos and plastic toys.”
Martin Schuster (1986), born in Postdam, Germany, currently lives and works in Leipzig, Germany. Martin graduated from the University of Art and Design in Halle, Germany (2014) and the University of Fine Arts in Hanoi, Vietnam (2012). Since his graduation, Martin has exhibited his work in art spaces, galleries and at art fairs. Among these are Galerie Intershop (Leipzig, Germany), Spazio MURKA (Florence, Italy) and at art fair Positions (Berlin, Germany). His work is included in various public and private collections.
What Martin Schuster finds interesting, is what his generation concerns. He is interested in exploring consumer behavior. Martin Schuster is inspired by memories and experiences from his childhood and youth. An inner lightness, that can be found in almost all of his paintings, contradicts thinking about a society whose capitalist structure is characterized by unfair hierarchies, consumption, strive for profit and growth. Schuster wonders how these symptoms affect our well-being, our feelings and desires.
Martin’s paintings shows parties, journeys, an escape from reality and a lot of contemporary surrealism. He intends to arrange his landscapes like stage settings, as they can be found in cinemas and theatres. Often, they are situated in a post-apocalyptic world, picturing the future, which actually turns out to be the present, or vice versa. A theme that appears consistently in his paintings is simultaneity: infinite pleasure, immeasurable possibilities of reason and intelligence, greed and senseless thrill coexist.
Martin noticed to himself, and in those around him, that there is a strong need for places of retreat. This determines his art, as well as an underlying optimism: Everything goes on somehow, and beautiful plants can grow on garbage. As measured by statistics, the world has never known more safety and liberty as it does today. How do we deal with the resulting freedom of choice and the knowledge about the responsibility of our actions? Schuster‘s biggests source of inspiration is the ambivalence of human life in a world that can appear beautiful and hideous.
Exhibitions at Galerie Nasty Alice: Shifting Times 2025 . Fantasia 2022 . Fair Share Art Fair 2022 . KunstRAI 2022 . Ein, Zwei, Drie, Vier 2021 . Land of Glory 2019 .
