Dutch society painter, autodidact.
She was born in Halfweg (Halfway), half way between the great Dutch painters cities Haarlem and Amsterdam. Her father was a carpenter, her mother was housewife. At age 11 she showed already a talent for painting. She visited the Lyceum at Haarlem. At age 16 when here family moved to Brabant, she wanted to visit the Famous Artist School. But this wish was not appreciated by her hard working parents. Do your best to survive in the physical world was there theme.
Ans Markus started professional painting around the age of 30, after an unhappy eleven years lasting seemingly necessarily marriage (1967-) that she from the start felt was doomed to fail. She married nevertheless as she was pregnant of her daughter and her later model Sigrid (1967) and saw no other way to go. But after the painful and her real personality insulting marriage her paintings became a way of healing, a way of unfolding herself and refinding her inner space. By painting and reading the books of Germaine Greer and Doris Lessing, she found herself back.
The hesitant unfolding of her hurt personality was first symbolised by her mysterious portraits of women in drapings. An early painting called “vleugellam” of a draped woman with a broken-winged birth (1980) appeared on the cover of the novel “Van Geluk gesproken” of Marijke Höweler (1982) The book was adapted to screen in 1987 as “Count your Blessings” and got many “calves” but flopped in the bioscopes.
In 1981 she had her first exposition at gallery Lambert Tegenbosch at Heusden with the draped woman theme. Her current partner, the art collector Wybe Tuinman bought her first painting Vleugellam (broken-winged) for 4000 guilders. Later themes were mirrors and circles, the mirrors obviously symbolising self-reflection and the circles symbolising her still unfolding world she said in an 2005 interview.
She is known to be interested in astrology and myths. Bad times predicted by her astrologer Peter de Vos became more bearable and tragic myths like that of Medea helped her to see her personal misery in a greater, more universal perspective: “In mijn werk probeer ik altijd boven mijn eigen gevoelens uit te stijgen, het universeel te maken..” (In my work I always try to transcend my own feelings, to make them more universal), she said in 2005 to Koos de Wilt. By doing so, she became a wounded healer that could learn form her painful past. But she kept a reserved attitude to the usual tragedies of life.
After a difficult period for a workaholic perfectionist, with bad health in 1994 (M. Pfeiffer), followed by a depression predicted to her, she painted gratefully the Zodiac paintings, dedicated to the stars that had mercifully guided her.
She is known to be a very private person, but once in a year guests are invited to her in 1995 opened Expo’Atelier at the Amsterdam Prinseneiland 14D. Here she also gives workshops.
On 6 November 2009 Markus was selected as Dutch artist of the year.
She is second best paid Amsterdam female artist after the since 1976 in Amsterdam residing Marlene Dumas (3 August 1953, Capetown).

Link to Wikipedia