Piero Manrique was born in Lima, Peru in 1981. He moved to New York with his family when he was 13.  Manrique began painting with oil on canvas soon after arriving in the U.S. He studied fine arts at Purchase College State University of New York before transferring to the Parsons School of Design in New York and graduating with a bachelor’s degree in architecture in 2005. 

After completing his studies at Parsons, Manrique worked as a designer and project manager for several large New York-based architectural firms while continuing to paint on canvas and exploring other mixed media art forms, including electronic art and sculpture. 

In addition to his work as a graphic and visual artist, Manrique is an avid salsa dancer, performer and choreographer.  His dance experience infuses his paintings with a sense of fluid energy and an awareness of the grace of the human body.

Manrique calls upon both his dance and his architectural design sensibilities in creating his art.  Although grounded by a solid sense of composition, all of his work exhibits the free stream of his imagination.  He uses fantastical flights of color to surround and overlay concrete images of individuals, landscapes and animals. His distinctive personal vision of surrealist dreamscapes invites the viewer to appreciate the splendor of the human body in juxtaposition to imagined technology and otherworldly forces.