Marcarson’s work arrives with an openness that feels intentional. It’s art without a dress code. No insider language, no pressure to perform expertise—just images that ask you to slow down, look closer, and trust your response.
His multifaceted approach—moving between painting, mixed media, fashion, and object-based thinking—does not dilute the practice; it expands it. Each discipline becomes another register through which he tests ideas, emotions, and symbols. Rather than separating these worlds, he allows them to inform one another, giving voice to different aspects of his creative thinking and allowing the work to remain porous, curious, and alive.
There is a generosity in Marcarson’s approach. It invites viewers in at multiple points of entry, particularly those new to collecting or engaging with contemporary art. You do not need to arrive with context to feel something here. The work meets you where you are.
In Self Affection, the painterly dimension of his practice comes into focus. The blue ground is built patiently, layer upon layer, producing depth that feels atmospheric rather than decorative. The neon-scripted phrase Alive with Pleasure floats within that field with restraint—reading as an interior statement rather than a public declaration. The work holds space for intimacy, for presence, for the quiet permission to feel.
Street Dog Disco, a mixed-media work on canvas, reveals another side of the practice. Here, negative space plays a central role. Silence becomes structural. The composition carries a sense of longing—an emotional pause that allows the viewer to project their own narrative into the gaps. It is a work that trusts restraint, letting absence speak as clearly as form.
In This Is America, Marcarson engages more directly with conceptual framing. The Duchampian influence is felt in the questioning of language, authorship, and national symbolism. The piece does not declare a position; it opens a space for reflection, using irony to loosen fixed assumptions and invite reconsideration.
Throughout the work, recurring themes surface with increasing clarity: inherited belief systems, desire held in tension, and the simplification of identity within American visual culture. His background—shaped by psychology, fashion, and editorial thinking—registers not as narrative, but as structure. These influences give the work its pacing, its awareness of symbols, and its sensitivity to what is said versus what is withheld.
Art-historical references—Duchamp, Warhol, Klee, Bacon—hover quietly in the background, serving as points of orientation rather than destination. What matters more is the sense of a voice beginning to settle into itself. The work feels attentive, edited, and increasingly confident in its own rhythm.
The upcoming Not For Them Pop Up Shop, launching in February 2026, reflects this same expansive thinking. Conceived as part art gallery, part oddity boutique, it will present original artworks alongside reworked vintage clothing and decor—objects selected for their texture, history, and emotional charge.
It is another platform through which Marcarson continues to explore how art lives beyond the wall. Further details will be shared via Instagram at @notforthemnyc.
