In a world where hostility is increasing towards any person who dares to question the boundaries and borders of bodies and earth, in a society where the concept of gender includes all the anxieties, neuroses and concerns of modern man, the… creatures of the artist Marianna Ignatakis compose a utopia, a place of alternative communities, where we all fit in and can be free. Her solo exhibition entitled “The Wise Men, the Green Horses and Some More Beasts”, which will be presented at the MOMus Museum of Contemporary Art in Thessaloniki from 5 June to 14 September 2025, is the second production in the museum’s Case Studio space, which is dedicated to the here-and-now of contemporary art, seeks to offer visibility to young and established artists and to bring the museum even closer to contemporary artistic creation.

Using watercolour, drawing, painting and sculptural installations, Marianna Ignataki creates characters outside of boundaries, frames and identities, in a surrealistic universe. Her work ranges from minimalist scenes and portraits to exaggerated, kitschy, rococo inspired compositions. The influences of her personal journey in Greece, China and Germany and the borrowing of anthropological elements from all three of these cultures are evident in all of her visual depictions, emphasizing that horror, fear and “monsters” are the same everywhere and unite us all everywhere.

Curator: Thodoris Markoglou, Art Historian, MOMus Curator

Marianna Ignataki was born in Thessaloniki (1977). She studied Architecture at the Technical University of Vienna and Visual Arts at the School of Fine Arts in Saint-Etienne.

She has presented many solo exhibitions such as (selection): The Secret Garden at Reiter Gallery, Leipzig (2023), The Hole at Bark Berlin (2021), Pleasure Drive, In A Deep, Dark Forest They Were Braiding The Beards Of Parrots In Love at CAN Christina Androulidaki Gallery, Athens (2019) and at the Municipal Gallery of Thessaloniki, Alatza Imaret, Thessaloniki (2018), The End of Magic at Outpost Slotervaart, Amsterdam (2012), Sphinx at Fake Space, Beijing (2011), This Joke Ain’t Funny Anymore at Zina Athanasiadou Gallery, Thessaloniki (2009), etc. α.

She has also participated in many group exhibitions in Europe, China and the USA, such as: The Seduction of the Uncanny at the National Gallery of Athens (2025), TERRA DIASPORA – Changing Worlds, Kunstverein Göttingen (2024), A:PRÉS D:ESSÉRT, A:D: Curatorial, Berlin (2023), Kreatur, Reiter galleries, Berlin, (2022), Drawing Wow, Minuseins, Vienna (2022), KI-NIMATA at Museum Bouboulinas, Spetses (2021), Gods and Monsters, Blick Auf Die Jüngste Vergangenheit, Kunstverein Montez, Frankfurt (2021), Homeostasis, Frontviews at Heit, Berlin (2019), Homeostasis, Frontviews at Heit, Berlin (2019), Athens Photo Festival, Benaki Museum, Athens (2019), Am I that name or that image, MoCA Skopje (2019), Reverse the Perspective, Xiangsi Art Museum, Tianjin (2015), Dialogue between Chinese and International Artists, Taihang Huang Shan, Renmin University Museum, Beijing (2014) etc. α.

Between 2010-2017 Marianna Ignataki was based in Beijing. Today she lives and works between Berlin and Athens.