Feb 15, 20162 min read

Eva Ryan’s emotional, existential, graphic drawings

Eva Ryan has always considered herself an empathetic person and close to nature. With her compassion loaded like a gun, along with her affinity for birds, She started a series of mixed media drawings in reference to human conditions and situations that are less than desirable. Grief, death, poverty, substance abuse and the questioning of moral and social standards are some of the subjects she explores. Not only is she making frank renderings of these subjects, She is also shedding some light onto these seemingly negative situations by using birds in place of humans. This leaves more to the imagination, provokes more thought, and brings out the beauty and positive qualities that live within negativity. These drawings are a wake up call and slap in the face to those living in denial, and her love letter to all things that suffer and have suffered.

Born somewhere and raised in various places, Eva Ryan is a self-taught mixed media artist primarily working with graphite and ink. Ryan is a Resident Artist at the HUD Gallery in Ventura, California, and a member of the Buenaventura Art Association. She brings together traditional drawing mediums with contemporary skepticism and presentation. Greatly influenced by her affinity for birds, her excess emotional baggage and past existential crisis, she poignantly observes and openly questions moral, societal norms and “big picture” ideas that choke-hold modern day society. Although often heavy in terms of subject matter, Ryan’s work is beautifully graphic, laboriously detailed and presented with nerve.

Eva Ryan – website