If you look at Marleen Maria’s often larger than life portraits, you are inevitable caught by the subject’s gaze. When painting a portrait, Marleen Maria focuses on the essence of the person, leaving out almost everything else. The gaze and the eyes reflect the eternal and the essence of the person in the portrait.

The starting point of all her (commissioned) paintings is a photo session. From the photographs she took, Marleen Maria selects the most striking one and starts making sketches based on it. The focus of the painting emerges from the sketches. The painting comes to life because she keeps adding transparent layers of paint on top of each other until the person’s essence appears on the canvas. Sometimes it is necessary for the model to pose during the making process.
When the painting is finished, Marleen Maria takes a photograph of the painting for her portfolio.