Amanda Marie

alt=Amanda Marie painting at Stroke Art Fair Munich, Germany May 2013.

Amanda Marie (full name Amanda Marie Ploegsma), also known by her artist moniker 'Mando Marie', born 1981, is an American painter formerly based in Colorado, currently based in Amsterdam, Netherlands, and exhibits in both the United States and Europe. She trained at Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design and is best known for her work as a stencilist, including large scale street art designs.

Imagery and media

Amanda Marie uses graphic stencils and images redolent of 'Golden Age' storybook imagery. In an article for Frame Publishers' online magazine frameweb.com, Carmel McNamara said these images: "straddle a line between comforting and spooky". She frequently features the signature characters of a young boy and girl. In 2012, Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art held a solo exhibition of her work and noted that these stylised figures: "seem to have been lifted from the pages of a mid-twentieth century children’s book and have traded the protective home of childhood nostalgia for a slightly more adventurous and unsettling world, somewhere between dream and reality".

Alongside recurring graphic themes of children and animals, she favors twin, repeated or mirrored imagery, developed with multiple uses of the same stencil on the artwork. In gallery, museum or other indoor exhibitions, she typically creates artworks using aerosol paint, acrylic and sewing pattern paper, on watercolor paper, canvas, or wood. She also uses screen printing technique and gel transfers. For outdoor work, the dominant materials are aerosol and acrylic.

Notable exhibitions

2015 December, SCOPE Art Fair, Miami, Florida July - Aug, Trailerpark Festival, Copenhagen, Denmark June, the Quin hotel, Good Story solo exhibition, New York, New York March, SCOPE Art Fair, New York, New York

2014

July - August, Beautiful Times (beautifultimes.net) an art making adventure and experiment, Boulder, Colorado, New York, New York Philadelphia, Beacon, New York April, Center For Audio Visual Expression (C.A.V.E. Gallery), Balancing Act solo exhibition, Venice Beach, California January, White Walls Gallery, I Was Just Thinking solo exhibition, San Francisco, California

2013

June, SCOPE Art Fair solo exhibition, Basel, Switzerland (Andenken Gallery) May, STROKE Art Fair group exhibition, Munich, Germany March, SCOPE Art Fair solo exhibition, New York, NY (Andenken Gallery). White Walls Gallery, While We Were Away group exhibition, San Francisco, California January, Center For Audio Visual Expression (C.A.V.E. Gallery), From Here On Out solo exhibition, Venice Beach, California

2012

December, SCOPE Art Fair solo exhibition, Miami, Florida (Andenken Gallery) October, Moniker Art Fair solo exhibition, London, UK September, STROKE Art Fair group exhibition, Berlin, Germany August, LA Mixtape LeBasse Projects group exhibition, Los Angeles, California May–June, Kunst RAI Art Fair solo exhibition, Amsterdam, Netherlands May, Schunk Museum Newseum Pink Pop group exhibition, Heerlen, Netherlands March, Battalion Inaugural Exhibition group exhibition, Amsterdam, Netherlands

2011

October, Moniker Art Fair group exhibition, London, UK. September, Andenken Gallery, See You Through It solo exhibition, Amsterdam, Netherlands. Fall 2011, Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, Purity & Credence solo exhibition, Boulder, Colorado May, Streetlab Project Space, Where On Earth Have You Been? group exhibition, Amsterdam, Netherlands

2009

December, StreetLab Project Space, Mish Mash KaBash group exhibition, Amsterdam, Netherlands February, Andenken Gallery solo exhibition, Denver, Colorado

2008

September, Plastic Chapel, Soft and Furry group exhibition, Denver, Colorado June, Andenken Gallery Merge three-person focus exhibition, Denver, Colorado May, Metropolis Gallery, two person exhibition, Lancaster, Pennsylvania

2007

December, Transmission Gallery, An Unfinished Storygroup exhibition, Richmond, Virginia. Thinkspace, API Benefit Show group exhibition, Los Angeles, California August–October, Andenken Gallery, Generation Gap solo exhibition, Denver, Colorado

Outdoor projects

Imaginary Girls, Amsterdam, Netherlands – June 2013 Gravity Kids, San Francisco, California – January 2013 Concrete Monster, Atzlan Northside Skate Park Mural, Fort Collins, Colorado – summer 2011 Urban Nature, Denver Botanic Gardens, Denver, Colorado – April–November 2008