Jean-Marc Calvet was born in 1965 in Nice and began painting in 2003, self-taught. His work, first made with house paint on any surface available, is recognisable by its wide-eyed figures, drawing on Mayan masks and art brut, where bright colours give way to a wealth of detail.

Now based in Granada, Nicaragua, he won the jury prize at the 7th Biennial of Nicaraguan Arts in 2009 and his work has entered the collections of the Flint Institute of Arts and the Museum of Arts and Design in New York.