Memos Makris was born in 1913 in Patras, Greece. He attended the Athens School of Fine Arts from 1934 until 1939 and soon joined the art group Neoi Protoporoi (Young Pioneers). During the war he fought at the Albanian Front and later was involved in the resistance movement. After having worked briefly with the sculptor Thanassis Apartis, he left Greece in 1945 along with 120 other sculptors and intellectuals to study at the Paris School of Fine Arts on a French scholarship. In Paris he completed his studies under Marcel Gimond and Henri Laurens and subsequently participated in many exhibitions, such as the Salon d’Automne, the Salon de la Jeune Sculpture, and the Salon des Tuileries. Although Makris spent only 5 years in Paris, this period left a lasting mark on his development as an artist. In 1950 he was deported from France due to his political allegiance to the Left and sought political asylum in Hungary, where as a member of the Artists’ Society he became an important figure in the country\'s political and cultural life. In 1964 he was deprived of his Greek nationality, which he regained in 1975 after the restoration of democracy in Greece. From 1978 onwards he lived both in Hungary and Greece and finally settled permanently in Athens in 1990. His work was presented in many solo and major group exhibitions in France, Greece, and Hungary. His first retrospective exhibition in Greece took place in the National Art Gallery in 1979. In 1995, two years after his death, a second retrospective was organized at the Municipal Gallery of Patras.

Memos Makris artwork is mostly anthropomorphic and combines elements of European modernism, socialist realism and Ancient Greek sculpture. Focusing on the general and universal, while discarding everything nonessential, Makris’ sculptures are characterized by austerity and robust sensibility. As can be appreciated in Femme qui se coiffe, 1965, Makris also remained true to his roots. In the words of Maria Karavia “Behind Memos Makris’ bathers, the girls who travel on the backs of dolphins, who dance or regard themselves in mirrors, one can just imagine the Aegean Sea and the limpidity of the Attic atmosphere in its pre-smog days.”

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The last sculptures of Makris consisted of a group of cactuses, his only artwork that is not anthropomorphic.  According to his friend and writer Andreas Frankias "(…) this series is startling. What’s surprising is that in their use of morphological material these strange plants compose an entire world that is in no way vegetable. Makris’ cacti, without ceasing to be cacti, convey unmistakable forms that are expressions of human states. While they are unlike anything else of his, they display a direct link to his previous work. They are its continuity and retain the same profound character.”

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Makris’ artwork adorns public places not only in Hungary, Greece, and Austria, but also in France and other European countries. Some of his monumental sculptures include the one dedicated to the victims of the Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria, the monument for the Hungarian volunteers of the Spanish Civil War in Budapest, and the monument of Liberation in Pécs. In Greece he is best known for his sculpture of the head of a youngster commemorating the 1978 Athens Polytechnic uprising.