surrealist

(Mark Ryden's 'The Ecstasy of Cecilia,' 1998)

One of my favorite surrealist artist is Mark Ryden. He has done the CD cover for Michael Jackson's History album. His work always invokes my imagination. What's real and imagined are constantly revolving in the space we inhabit. That space hangs in mid-air, kind of perplexing and confusing. It has no real tangible essence.

With surrealism, I also think of B.B. King's quote, 'The beautiful thing about learning is that no one can take that away from you.' Mark Ryden's work invites one to probe deeply into the symbols that make up the whole meaning of the piece. That intersection between what's real and what's imagined are interplaying with each other within a space that becomes knowledge, confusion, and self-discovery. Those complexities suspend us in and out of nowhere in our minds and realities to conclude that everything may or may not have answers. That is the power of surrealist work which is so fascinating to me. I try not to take that space for granted but take it for what it is. It sparks every thread of imagination in me and feeds more creativity into reality. Hope it does that for anyone else too. Thanks for reading.