Marcelo Tinoco (São Paulo, Brazil, 1967) lives and works in São Paulo. He holds a degree in Fine Arts from Fundação Armando Alvares Penteado, obtained in 1993, and has devoted himself to photography since childhood: the son of a photographer, he grew up in black-and-white darkrooms and, by the age of 12, was already developing his own film and making photographic montages. For much of his career, he ran his own commercial photography studio. In 2010, he established himself as an artist in the field of contemporary art.
The artist refers to his technique as "multidisciplinary photography." Tinoco combines his own photographic images with painting, intervening in the photographic image through collage, cutouts and digital brushstrokes. His research takes the photographic image as its starting point, shifting the medium from its role as a faithful representation of reality toward other fields of the visual arts, above all painting. References to the Impressionist movement, the natural light of landscapes, and figures and sites such as Burle Marx (the Brazilian landscape architect), the Jardim Botânico do Rio de Janeiro and Kew Gardens in London inform recent series that bring together photographs of tropical gardens taken during his travels. The artist collects plants as one collects characters, transforming each image into a narrative that moves beyond the real.
He received the Prêmio Funarte Marc Ferrez de Fotografia (2013) and an award at the 45º Salão de Arte de Piracicaba (2013). His solo exhibitions include Museu de Novidades at Zipper Galeria (2020); Era Uma Vez at Zipper Galeria (2014); Histórias Naturais at Caixa Cultural Rio de Janeiro (2014); Timeless, which toured the Museu Municipal de Hortolândia (2025), the Museu Municipal Eduard Coruripe Costa (Votuporanga, 2023) and the Memorial Rezende Barbosa (Assis, 2013); Nova Fotografia at the Museu da Imagem e do Som de São Paulo (2012); and Fotorama at the Brazilian Consulate in Frankfurt (2011). He has also participated in group exhibitions including Natureza Viva at Centro Cultural FIESP (São Paulo, 2024); Ao Amor do Público 1 at Museu de Arte do Rio (2016); 65º Salão Paranaense at MAC do Paraná (2014); and the I FotoBienal MASP/Pirelli (MASP, 2013), which also traveled to Museu Oscar Niemeyer (Curitiba, 2013-2014). His works are held in the collections of Museu de Arte do Rio, Museu da Imagem e do Som de São Paulo and the Brazilian Consulate in Frankfurt. He published Diorama (a result of the Marc Ferrez Award), through MIS (2014), and has taught courses and workshops at institutions including MIS, Itaú Cultural and Caixa Cultural Rio.