Out Ryden the strange
Right down to his little goatee, Mark Ryden has stepped from an Old Dutch painting. From there it was apparently a stumble through Haight-Ashbury (a “trip”, I think they used to call it) and far, far too many hours in the museum of natural history with the fox skulls and the stuffed opossum.
We welcome almost anyone at Dali House, so open are our minds, but Mark Ryden, who we’ve given The Room at the End of the Hall for now, wants keeping an eye on, and not necessarily because he’s destined for great things, if you catch our drift.
He wasn’t born until 1963, so chances are his parents took care of all the love-groovy things while he was still growing up in Southern California. They obviously gave their kids some great books to read, though, as hippie parents always did.
Another bizarro act championed by Juxtapoz Magazine, like Banksy of the booming brick wall, Ryden is in a whole ‘nother universe, a “parallel universe”, as folks are wont to say about him. There are messages in his paintings, yes, and definitely a neck-twisting rush, but as for getting a headlock on the attention span, it’s all a little … too … cute.
Cute?! See the rest.
