Mari Salmonson is a Brazilian artist, designer, and storyteller. She grew up between São Paulo and Florianópolis. Florianópolis has a nickname: Ilha da Magia. The Island of Magic. It earns it. Myths there are not stored in books. They move through daily life, through what people believe, through how the island speaks. Moving there, she went deep into Brazilian legends. Encantados. Forest spirits. Figures of resistance and survival. That immersion became the architecture of everything she makes.
She began drawing before she can remember deciding to. After high school, that instinct found its first professional form in fashion design, the place where visual language and cultural identity intersect most visibly. That chapter led to murals. Murals led to painting. Painting expanded into a practice that now spans illustration, digital media, live performance, children's books, and public art.
In 2019 she moved to Chicago, where she pursued studies at the Art Institute of Chicago. In 2021 she moved to Seattle. In 2026, to New York, where she is based today. Her work is organized into four series.
- Tropical Echoes explores Brazilian fauna as cultural carriers. Not decoration. Vessels of memory and meaning.
- Living Myths draws from Amazonian and Brazilian folklore, treating its mythological figures as feminist archives.
- Identity Echoes, launched in 2025, is a global multimedia project. Through interviews, poetry, and visual art, it traces how identity forms, fractures, and reimagines itself across borders.
- Threads of Belonging examines community and connection as subjects in their own right.
Running alongside this work is Solarium, a children's book universe centered on Dr. Sapo, a magical being who teaches children to see the world differently. The first book, Doutor Sapo: A Aventura com Francisco, was published in January 2025.
Her work has crossed industries. Collaborations with fashion, music, education, and public art institutions include a partnership with TA Studios at São Paulo Fashion Week, where her patterns rooted in cordel aesthetics reached the runway. She has painted murals commissioned by the São Paulo Secretary of Culture, performed live at Sofar Sounds, illustrated a music video for Coral da USP and Lenine entirely in cordel style, and curated the centennial celebration of Monteiro Lobato's Narizinho alongside the author's great-granddaughter. Her studio, Mari Salmonson Creative Design, has been her creative home since 2016.
Art is a bridge between cultures, between people, and between the stories we tell and the ones we live.
Exhibitions · Solo Clube Athletico Paulistano, 2019, São Paulo, Brazil Negro Café, 2018, São Paulo, Brazil Liberdade at Otto Bistrot, 2014, São Paulo, Brazil
Exhibitions · Group Respeitável Imaginário, 2026, Museu A CASA do Objeto Brasileiro, São Paulo, Brazil With André Menezes (PE), Dada Venceslau (BP), Mestre Jasson (AL), Mano de Bae (PE), Petrônio (AL)
Murals & Public Art Brazil in 4 Acts, Kirkland, Washington, 2026 The Enchanted Forest, Mercer Island, Washington, 2026 House of Culture of Butantã, invited by the São Paulo Secretary of Culture, 2016 Vila Butantan Open Mall, graffiti installation on container architecture, 2017 Ultra Filmes, corporate wall art, 2017 Respirartes Collective, 2017 Lumberjills, 2017 Ser o Que Coaching Agency, 2015 Commissioned works for private residences, São Paulo
Live Performances & Media Bonde Collective, art, fashion, music festival, exhibition and art sale, 2026 Live painting at Sofar Sounds São Paulo Exhibition at Sofar Sounds, 2013 Mother's Day Showcase, Instituto Brasileiro de Moda (IBMODA) Cover and Editorial Artist, ANTENNA WEB Magazine, Issues 8 and 9
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