Jean Marie van Staveren was born on March 21, 1946 in Rotterdam, Holland. She studied at Art Academy Amersfoort, and the Utrecht School of the Arts, first grade drawing and art history, from 1979 to 1984, She graduated from Utrecht University in Art History and Archaeology in 1993. She was a teacher at the School of the Arts from 1986 - 2010. She currently lives and works both in Spain and the Netherlands.

Her work is both abstract and figurative. Sources of inspiration are the landscape and human. Her paintings are characterized by sincere direct rawness. The abstracted figurative work shows the many sides that life offers. The works are mostly executed in mixed media, oil and acrylics, and printmaking. She is an admirer of the work of Lucian Freud and Francis Bacon and sometimes makes paintings with the same subject or variations. Her work fits between abstract expressionism and the Cobra movement of the two currents that dominated art world after World War II. Her work is characterized by using tertiary colors and bright colors. Topics include figurative, imaginary portraits and abstract landscapes.

Her work has won public tenders, in corporate collections and private collections. Her work was exhibited in Madrid during the Premio Pentura. In 2000, van Staveren nominated for the art prize 2000 by the Internet platform ArtOlive for lending and selling art. In 1986 she received the BJ Kerkhof Prize for her entire oeuvre. In 1999 she received the Boellaard Prize of the Society Kunstliefde Utrecht. van Staveren is Chairman of the Fundación Cultural Knecht-Drenth Callosa d'En Sarria (Alicante) Spain since 2008.

Taken from Wikipedia