The inspiration behind my ideas.

I haven't really posted about the inspirations that are guiding me throughout this project, I tend to keep everything in my head, and put everything in my head down on a piece, then nobody else understands what I've done and the meaning behind it, because I've kept everything locked up ... This is very frustrating, not only for the person looking at my work ... but for me as well! So ... I'm going to make a few posts more about my inspirations,

Artists I have found most inspiring are ...

• Mark Ryden
• Goya
• H.R. Geiger
• Zack Dunn
• Junji Ito
• Francis Bacon.

First off a lot of people have told me to look into Francis Bacon. Now this MAY sound weird, but I feel that his style is a bit too out there for how I want my imagery to look, his images don't seem to have that 'still human' aspect of them that Zack Dunn's have. I chose these from his pieces as my favourites though. I like his use of triptychs, this is something I want to do with my three final images. I really love the 'Screaming Pope' the colours are really striking, I may do some tests based around a limited colour palette like in this painting.

I chose the artists mentioned because they all have a deliciously creepy style to them and they all feature something that I want to incorporate into my final images, when I begin my studies I want to keep certain aspects of their unique features in my minds eye. I'll go into each of them and explain how they've inspired me. 

• Mark Ryden - I love the innocence that is portrayed within his paintings, but they also convey a sense of danger ... the fact he uses very child/like looking characters and puts them in grown up and weird situations is really unnerving and something I would like to incorporate in my final images. His style is very soft and colourful, which normally I love so much but for this project where I need dark atmosphere, is not something I can follow.

• Goya - I'm most inspired by his 'Black Paintings' the name given to a group of fourteen paintings from the later years of Goya's life, 'Satan Devouring His Son' (pictured below) is my favourite in particular. The muted colour with the splash of blood red is so eerie. The paintings in this group are very basic in their style almost, the backgrounds are either black and thus make the titular characters pop out which is something I am actively looking to do and the colours are all very similar ranging from mute yellows beige and browns. This simple but effective way of painting would would best with my Rat Torture concept.

• H.R. Geiger - Obviously Geiger is creepy painting with hidden meaning royalty and his work is PERFECT for my project. The hidden but not hidden elements of sexuality is something I would love to bring to my images especially with my Pear of anguish concept, with the pear being used in genital areas I could bring something into the image without showing anything. I love the lack of colours in his pieces as they are mostly in greys, blacks and whites.

• Zack Dunn - I really love the hyper-extension (extension of a limb or part beyond the normal limit) of the facial features in his paintings, the way he paints white lines on the right points of the image, makes the creature on the canvas look like it's about to jump out and get you, the surreal nature of his works is something that gives me crazy shivers just looking at them. hyper-extension is something I want to pursue with my pear of anguish

• Junji Ito - Ito's work is just plain scary, the simple black and white manga lines take out all forms of colour, and it makes the work all the more in the mind of the viewer, his drawings are exaggerated and weird and have given me a lot of influence with my ideas. 

I chose a selection of their work (and a few random creepy images from google) and put them into moodboards, I think all these styles work together, even the slightly pastel, girly style of Ryden doesn't look out of place next to Ito and Dunn.