Jannis Markopoulos - JM-P-2026

Concept of the work

In this work, Vincent van Gogh is mentally summoned to the present and continued as a contemporary artist. The work rests on the artistic claim that Vincent van Gogh lives today, observes our world, and portrays himself anew—with the means, awareness, and perfectionism of the 21st century.

The self-portrait should not be understood as a copy or stylistic imitation, but as a transformation: Vincent van Gogh's introspective gaze, his engagement with identity, transience and self-reflection are transferred into a contemporary context. The painting combines the depth and seriousness of the old masters with the precision, the technical ambition, and the sensibility of our time.

The work raises the question of authorship and temporality:
What would an artist like Vincent van Gogh see today?
How would he present himself if he were confronted with the knowledge, experiences, and visual language of our present?

The artist deliberately claims that Vincent van Gogh himself painted this self-portrait—but not in a historical sense, but as a mental and artistic continuation. Thus a tension arises between past and present, original and interpretation, myth and contemporary reality.

Uniqueness and Authenticity

The image is an original work, created in the year 2020.
There are no further versions, reproductions, or duplicates.

The handwritten signature is located on the back of the work, at the top right.
The artwork comes directly from the artist and is accompanied by a certificate of authenticity, which is also hand-signed by the artist.

Artistic statement

This work presents itself as a dialogue spanning centuries. It fuses historical greatness with contemporary perfectionism and invites the viewer to conceive art not as a closed chapter, but as a living, ongoing process.

CV: Jannis Markopoulos is a multimedia artist.
Markopoulos has participated in 124 major Exhibitions and 11 Biennials.
As with his paintings, his installations can consist of small objects as well as a room-sized environment. His
Enormous outdoor installations have gained the attention of an international art public.
The Pendulum 1991. The installation The Pendulum “Living Pictures” bares references to both Edgar Allen
Poe as well as Foucault.
“The Binding” was awarded in 1996, he bound a house in a shape of a pyramid of a which was about to be
demolished down to the earth with 52,000 meters of red cord. A work concerned with time and space, movement and immobility, progress and tradition as well as past, present and future.
Infected arthritis in the National Gallery, La Paz, Bolivia, Biennale 2013. Acute inflammation of one or more
joints caused by art infection. Suppurative Artitis may follow certain bacterial infections. Soul, Spirit and
The brain becomes swollen, hot, sore, and filled with the cheesy pus of contemporary art, which erodes their intellect.
cartilage, causing permanent damage if not promptly treated by giving art antidote. This installation was a
Collaboration between Jannis Markopoulos and local people in Titicacasea village.
Idyll Installation Presented at the Liverpool Biennial 2004, 4 Mediations Biennale Poznan Poland 2014.
In 2015, Mana Contemporary was awarded the second prize in New Jersey – Jersey City, USA.
The Venice Biennale 2017 - 57th International Art Exhibition VIVA ARTE VIVA National Participation.
2017 Guest Professor, Albertina Academy of Fine Arts, Turin.
Another Markopoulos-Performance gained the attention of the art world in Berlin. The installation “Anthropos”
from the psychological project-series “Living Pictures” (installations with people) showed a living
A human being inside a cage at the Berlin Zoo. Here, the artist conveys the feelings of the different human relationships.
within the society of a big city, where the so-called next man sometimes appears to be more of a strange
and possibly fear invoking animal.
Markopoulos Performances are realised in the Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin and Alte Nationalgalerie.Lion
Feininger, Paul Gauguin - The Lost Paradise, and Masterpieces from the Museum of Modern Art, New
York in the Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin with the performance of Les Bourgeois de Calais.
Goya, Prophet of the Modern Alte Nationalgalerie.
At the Círculo de Bellas Artes (Madrid), in conjunction with two exhibitions.
The crowning moment was the official participation in the Venice Biennale 2017 with the General Concept Essence.
The conflicts of the 21st century is indisputably a reflection of the deep crisis of humanism and consequently
of the concepts that have sustained the current civilizing paradigm dominated by modern thought and positivism.