Meet the Artist

Meet our latest art obsession: Marco Walker, a longtime commercial photographer who, in the last few years, has transitioned toward other forms of art, like collage and sculpture. If you’re in our Soho store in New York, take a close look at the framed works—you’ll find Walker’s images mixed in with our latest collection. 

When did the art bug bite?
My father and grandfather were both keen photographers, so there were always cameras lying around the house and my mother has always been a big art enthusiast.

What are some of your art influences and inspirations?
I have always been incredibly inspired by Avedon, William Eggleston, Slim Aarons and Martin Parr, whom I believe were and are still some of the greatest pioneers of color photography as art. Outside of photography, I love the Italian Futurist movement, Cubism and Surrealism; Giorgio De Chirico, Eduardo Paolozzi and John Baldessari have also all been great favorites.

Tell us about your signature style…
If I was to describe my style in two words, it would be Hyper Surrealism. When I shoot people, whether portraits or campaigns and also for my reportage work, I use a freeze-action technique. I do this with a heavy use of flash to overpower daylight.

What do you love about collage work?
For me, my interest in exploring and working with collages gave me the opportunity to push the boundaries of my image making. There are less limitations with collage—anything is possible!

The themes you're drawn to again and again?
The theme that is most strongly represented in my work, and which I am most consistently drawn back to, is nature. I grew up spending as much time as I could outdoors: winters skiing in Austria and summers in Lake Tahoe. As a young child, I had a strong affinity to trees, mountains, vast landscapes and generally the importance of nature. I feel now, as an adult, it is my responsibility to champion nature and its ever-growing importance through my work. And then, of course, my kids are always fun and engaging subjects (although less and less willing as they grow older… sadly).

And your preferred tools of the trade?
I love that today, in our ever-evolving landscape of new tech, I can both play on new digital equipment for my work while also still enjoying and mixing in traditional camera and dark-room processes.

When you get the artist equivalent of writer’s block…
When I am not feeling inspired, I find the best thing to do is force myself to go out and shoot (however much I am not in the mood) and that always seems to clear it for me.

Current art obsessions in this new normal?
Last month I collaborated with my London gallery on a virtual exhibition space and had a show of my best-selling landscape works as lightbox editions. This concept has been really well received and has opened me—and I am sure other artists and galleries—up to new formats of exhibiting outside of the traditional white box space. I am currently exploring other virtual exhibition environments to exhibit. The possibilities are endless and the production costs are low so this, for me, is exciting in the new norm.

What you're most looking forward to this summer…
Lockdown has been a great time to deep dive into research for a couple of projects I wanted to get moving on but hadn’t had the chance, as the first part of the year was nonstop traveling for work. Now I am excited to get back to shooting. We have a road trip planned to visit my parents and my parents-in-law and will be driving from London to the South of France and then across Italy to Austria. I planned the route so I can tie the trip in with lots of places I want to explore for work.