Mark Ryden: The Gay 90's

by Mark Ryden, Amanda Erlanson, Anthony Haden-Guest (Forward)

Celebrated Pop Surrealist artist Mark Ryden’s newest body of work, presented in this book for the first time. Crowned "the high prince of Lowbrow," Mark Ryden has become a fixture of the contemporary alternative art movement. In his newest work, Mark The Gay 90’s, the artist casts his skewed perspective toward the turn of the nineteenth century with such creepy yet beautiful works as a portrait of Abraham Lincoln dressed in foppish 1890s fashion and surrounded with a heavenly nimbus, Jesus Christ playing a pink piano for an audience of kewpie triplet girls, and a Gibson girl in a tight corset constructed entirely of meat. With masterful painting technique and disquieting content, Ryden’s newest paintings display his fascination with the earnest kitsch found in popular art of the end of the 1800s, yet reinforces how his paintings now more than ever are a skewering of both historical and current pop cultural touchstones. Ryden’s visual cues range from cryptic to cute, balancing his compositions between nostalgic cliché and disturbing archetype. This book showcases his talent for creating paintings that marry accessibility and technique with visceral resonance and sociocultural relevance, making it easy to see why he garners the ardent attention of museums, critics, and serious collectors alike.

Genres: Art, Nonfiction

128 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2013

About the author

Blending themes of pop culture with techniques reminiscent of the old masters, Mark Ryden has created a singular style that blurs the traditional boundaries between high and low art. His work first garnered attention in the 1990s when he ushered in a new genre of painting, "Pop Surrealism", dragging a host of followers in his wake. Ryden has trumped the initial surrealist strategies by choosing subject matter loaded with cultural connotation.

Ryden’s vocabulary ranges from cryptic to cute, treading a fine line between nostalgic cliché and disturbing archetype. Seduced by his infinitely detailed and meticulously glazed surfaces, the viewer is confronted with the juxtaposition of the childhood innocence and the mysterious recesses of the soul. A subtle disquiet inhabits his paintings; the work is achingly beautiful as it hints at darker psychic stuff beneath the surface of cultural kitsch. In Ryden's world cherubic girls rub elbows with strange and mysterious figures. Ornately carved frames lend the paintings a baroque exuberance that adds gravity to their enigmatic themes.

Mark Ryden received a BFA in 1987 from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. His paintings have been exhibited in museums and galleries worldwide, including a retrospective “Wondertoonel” at the Frye Museum of Art in Seattle and Pasadena Museum of California Art, and in the exhibition "The Artist's Museum" at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. He currently lives and works in Los Angeles.

Reviews

[Forrest · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am an unabashed fan of Pop Surrealism (aka "Low Brow") art. Ryden is one of the most prolific and high-profile artists of the movement. His self-admitted goal in producing the work represented in The Gay 90's is to "pull the lowest of the low into the highest of the high" by reinterpreting the kitsch representations of the 1890's (most of which were actually realized in the 1920's) as surreal-renaissance-style paintings. There is a sense of the solemn, even the divine, in the paintings themselves, but with such a twisted absurdity as to be transgressive. The painting "The Parlor" is a good representation of Ryden's aesthetic, showing porcelain-skinned Victorian girls in a parlor featuring a curiosity cabinet (carefully-planned in every detail by Ryden, as evinced by a pre-painting sketch), a tuxedoed and top-hatted Death holding a tarot card, and a gigantic eye set atop an antiqued wooden post. The center of attention is an infant (the Christ? Difficult to say, though Ryden has representations of Christ throughout the rest of the book) holding a clock-cum-image-of-eternity - a swirling snail-shell clock surrounded by symbols from the Zodiac, along with a series of Chinese symbols (that, alas, I cannot interpret). Near the eye, a nude goddess figure sits atop an overly cheerful creature somewhere between a lamb, a polar bear, and a poodle. This mixture of a sacred mood overlaying a ridiculously kitsch menagerie of figures, is emblematic of Ryden's work.

Ryden's work can be found all over online, but this book is worth owning because of the many preliminary sketches, which show the evolution of Ryden's thoughts in the very act of creation, and because of the outstanding introductory essay, "Mark Ryden and the Transfiguration of Kitsch" by Amanda Erlanson. These provide an excellent introduction to Ryden, his work, and his place among the contemporary luminaries of Pop Surrealism.

[Laren]

Tom Robbins introduced me to Mark Ryden...have been a fan ever since! So faerie, but I never understood all the...meat.

[Elysia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ryden's art is simultaneously elegant and nightmarish in nature. I really enjoyed looking more into the artist's body of work, and was lucky enough to find this book half price (art books are so expensive). This will definitely be a book to refer back to. I really enjoyed the inclusion of not only the artist's paintings, but also sketches and drawings; revealing the process of art making.

[Megan (ReadingRover) · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is disturbingly gorgeous. I absolutely love Mark Ryden’s work. The doe eyes and large bobble heads project such a delicate innocence that is such a stark contrast to whatever gory task the subject is up to. I can’t get enough of it. My favorite is the girl in the meat dress. The way the shanks of meat hang with their glistening fat looks so unnaturally beautiful it’s just unreal. At first when you look at the painting you don’t even realize what it is. The porcelain version is even better. The Lincolns too. So serious yet so surreal. It’s all such feast for an art aficionado’s eyes. I know I sound disgusting. But to each her own. Don’t knock it till you try it! This shit is fabulous!

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love the artistic style, but I've never been fond of the continued meat theme (I like the sugar themes). It was great to look through so many of his pieces, especially with the ballet Whipped Cream by Strauss and concurrent exhibit currently (May 2017) running in NYC. I am super bummed I cannot afford the trip right now.

[Nerdy Werewolf · Rating 5 out of 5]

I mean, this could have absolutely no words or explanations and I'd still love it. Mark Ryden has and probably always will be my very favorite artist. He's so weird...just the way I like it. :)

[Eliza Daken · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing as always

[Dawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Somehow none of Ryden's books have impressed me enough to give them 5 stars and yet I really do love his work.

[frogfairie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mark Ryden always equals interesting and fun!

[Shona · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautiful art.