Mark Ryden in his studio
I have first encountered Mark Ryden's art in the art magazine Juxtapoz in the late 90's and have been following his work since. The top 3 paintings are from his "Blood" series, more creepy than usual , but perfect for my Halloween gallery. The image of the lone girl in the big, puffy skirt is called "The Debutant" and we own this print by him. It is one of my favorite paintings and one day I'll make myself a costume like that. All these bizarre items, that are attached to her skirt, are icons of some sort or another, but jumbled together their meaning is put out of its original context. As a child my parents used to have one of these drawers with little compartments for type setting. They hung it on the wall and displayed little meaningful objects in the different compartments: a little Buddha statue, a silver dollar, my baby tooth, a sea shell, a plastic toy soldier... a collage of objects that each have memories and meaning attached to them, but together they have no relationship.
I also love the last image, which is from his latest exhibition, "the tree show" and it is called "Allegory and the four elements".
