Biography
In today’s globalized world, it is hard to imagine someone who would create something new without following any rules of mainstream standards. However, to every rule there is an exception, and Thomas Marecki, better known as Marok, is one of them. In the past two decades, he has created a remarkable body of work disclaiming any control but that of his own imagination and ideas. Back in 1995, Marecki started Lodown magazine, which was billed as the pop culture magazine covering topics that opposes mainstream and contemporary marketing structures. Additionally, his books Lodown Graphic Engineering Pt.1 (1999), and Schizophrenic! Lodown graphic engineering Pt.2 (2000) celebrated young subculture between American pop art, graffiti, electronic music and skateboarding. Thomas Marecki is also an artist widely recognized for his pictures and installations about mobility.
Beginnings and Lodown Magazine
Born in 1972 in Berlin, Thomas Marecki aka Marok began his career as a graphic designer in the early nineties. Simultaneously, he also did graffiti, adopting a pseudonym “Marok” which he kept as a trademark name for his later projects. His interest in design, typography and layout began to grow immensely, so it doesn’t surprise that each episode of his Lodown magazine had a unique design and font. Starting in 1995, the magazine ran for 100 episodes to 2016 winning Lead Awards in 2003, 2004, 2007 and 2011. Featuring primarily articles on popular culture and boardsports, but also on contemporary art, music, film, fashion, lifestyle and literature, Lodown reflects a Zeitgeist in a non-mainstream way.
Marok’s Art Career
In addition to his work as publisher and creative director of Lodown magazine, Marecki is working on various projects. Some of them can be found in his book M – transforming language (2002), where Marok unlocked his personal archive of his own works, illustrations, photographs, ideas and drafts. One of his projects is entitled Traphic where he fuses visuals and texts around the subjects ‘Traffic’ and ‘Graphics’, merging to ‘Traphic’. It represents the natural and necessary result of his linguistic and artistic investigation, as well as his fascination with mobility. This led to Garage Grit, a show curated by himself. It featured various artists and their positions to vehicles and transportation, information and traffic, self-induced technology and documented artistic activism against the odds, far forerunning industrial adaption.
For Thomas Marecki creativity is connected to the idea of walking paths no one walked before while investigating totally new and unknown fields. His art has been included in exhibitions throughout the world. One of his latest solo shows was on display at Open Walls Gallery in Berlin. Entitled The Private Sketch, it included Marok’s graphic works and sketches made between 1996 and 2016, as well as some new works produced exclusively for this show. The exhibition also featured smaller pieces and unpublished works, including pre-production sketches, private drawings, and collages. The Private Sketch was on display in July 2016.
Selected exhibitions
- 2016 · The Private Sketch · Solo show · OPEN WALLS Gallery · Berlin (Germany)
- 2013 · Garage Grit · MU Gallery · Eindhoven (The Netherlands)
- 2008 · Berliner Strasse · Group Exhibition · BHC/Circleculture Gallery · Berlin (Germany)
- 2008 · The Alternative Philosophy · Group Exhibition · The Leonard Street Gallery · London (UK)
- 2007 · Marok 3-6 · Beinghunted Gallery · Berlin (Germany)
- 2004 · Ill communications 2 · Urbis Museum · Manchester (UK)
- 2004 · Vehicles Autistique · Circle Culture gallery · Berlin (Germany)
- 2003 · Friendly Facings · Asanoha gallery · Tokyo (Japan)
- 2003 · Casual Prophecies · Nike spiritroom · Berlin (Germany)
- 2001 · Marok · Capsule · Birmingham (UK)
- 2001 · Schizophrenic · FFDW Gallery · Berlin (Germany)