Mark Ryden is the subject of an intriguing exhibition in the Galerie Perrotin located in the heart of the Marais in Paris.

Mysterious and mythical creatures

The exhibition brings together ten paintings and twelve works on paper : this corpus is part of a series of portraits representing mysterious and mythical creatures, enchanted characters who intersect archetypes, kitsch and narrative mysticism. Animal Secrets echoes Yakalina 9, the artist’s latest exhibition at Perrotin Tokyo. Mark Ryden’s artistic approach and imagination have several meanings and connotations. His interest in animals as spiritual entities first shines through in his Anima Animals series, exhibited by Kasmin and Perrotin in Shanghai.

Neither human nor animal

The production of this series, in 2020, coincides with the start of the pandemic and the first confinement. Isolated, like the rest of the world, in his studio in the heart of the Pacific Northwest, Ryden then began to paint paintings of hybrid creatures, like guides in an unknown landscape. The figures that are born under his brush are neither human nor animal. These are spiritual entities linking the animal world and the human world, between which there is a cruel lack of harmony. The enigmatic characters of Ryden coexist harmoniously with nature in the midst of idealized landscapes. These peaceful settings evoke the nostalgia of romantic imagery, the dream of a golden age lost since antiquity. Simplicity and balance are the strength of this iconography where, with a simple glance, the mythical entity engages in a silent conversation with the spectator and arouses, in him, the desire for a harmonious cohabitation with nature, with others, with oneself. -same. Bearers of a sensitive and humanist philosophy, Anima animals stand out as spiritual guides supposed to connect us to the world around us.

Exhibited in galleries around the world

A graduate of the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California (1987), Mark Ryden is exhibited in museums and galleries around the world. His retrospective at The Centro de Arte Contemporáneo of Málaga dates back to 2020. That of the Frye Museum of Art, in Seattle, and the Pasadena Museum of California Art, entitled Wondertoonel, dates from 2004-2005. . In 2017, Ryden created, at the request of the American Ballet Theater, the set and costumes for the ballet Whipped Cream, choreographed by Alexi Ratmansky. The drawings, sketches, paintings executed for this show were exhibited at the Met Gallery of the Metropolitan Opera House and, at the same time, at the Kasmin Gallery. Ryden lives and works in Portland, Oregon.

https://leaflet.perrotin.com/fr/view/224/animal-secrets

Galerie Perrotin

76 Rue de Turenne, 75003 Paris