Mark Ryden

I was first exposed to Mark Ryden through “Incarnation” (first painting). The reason I was attracted was mainly because of his marvelous skills, the way everything looks so neat and controlled, and the human features fantasy-like, yet looks so solid and real, making the painting a visual feast. After so, I began exploring more of his works and realized that there are, actually, reasons behind his bizarre choices of subject matters. Basically, to me it seems to show how children of the modern society, or even people of the world in general, are losing their purity, innocence, virtues and perhaps their sanity. And then I thought, hey, this kinda relates to my theme.

To some, his works may be called grotesque, creepy or even morbid, yet it’s exactly the “twist”, the controversial theme that creates its amusing appeal.

His paintings are mostly surrealist-inspired with a hint of Alice In Wonderland turned bad, innocence turned sour. Ryden tends to present his works I a manner which involves much contrast: heavy use of pastels and severely contrasting bold colours, “naïve” little girls with corrupted thoughts. These contrasts present a sense of dark humour to his paintings.

The main characters, children, always have disproportionately large heads with gigantic doe eyes that seem to wander far away. At first glance, one probably will find these characters extremely lovable and cute, but not the case once upon closer inspection, when you witness the emptiness that resides behind those eyes. Yet, I just love it because of those lifeless, dazed eyes, which is totally unlike what a normal, happy kid’s bright eyes will look like. At times, not-so-innocent fantastical creatures make their appearance, increasing the surrealistic atmosphere.

The creepy combination of saccharine fantasy-like characters painted with detailed fullness and the more controversial subject matters such as religion-based symbolism, meat and mutation seemed to be the best way to illustrate the ugly truths of the world to viewers.

Overall, his wonderful technique that allows him to paint freakishly beautifully and how he subtly(sometimes) presents the problems in our modern society has an astounding sense of presence. And that’s what intrigues me the most. Quoted from Gary Faigin, “In the paintings of Mark Ryden, at least we are beautiful losers.”

This then brings me to how Mark Ryden’s paintings are my inspiration as they somehow do link to my chosen theme: Lost (and found). His themes, although subtle is quite similar my theme (although I definitely would not paint so morbidly), and I really want to adopt the way he paints his characters. The look in their eyes just mesmerize me. I also like how the background always looks so misty and undefined.

(Yoshi)

(Tubbies)

(Santa Worm)

So many talented (and weird) people in the world...