Pol Mara (1920 - 1998)  Pol Mara was born in 1920 in Antwerp, Belgium - studied at the Royal Academy and National Higher Institute of Fine Arts in Antwerp and exhibited his work worldwide since the early 1950s.

 

His work has been shown in museums and biennial exhibitions in Antwerp (where the Provincial Museum now has a "Mara Room"), Brussels, Mexico City, Valparaiso Chile, Le Havre, Venice (34th Biennial), Tokyo, Seoul, Osaka, and many other cities.

 

Mara received the Critics' Laureate Prixe of the Belgian chapter of the International Association of Art Critics, the Modern Art Prize at the Ninth Tokyo Biennial, the Laureate Prize of the First Diano Marina International in Italy, the Laureate Grand Prize of the Barcelona International Biennial of the Fine Arts. Mara was named Officer of the Orders of Léopold and of The Crown and Cultural Ambassador of Flanders and was named Honorary Citizen of Gordes, France, where a museum dedicated to his work opened in 1996.