Ruben Ireland
At a first glance of Ruben ’s work, it seems that the London artist has ripped advertisements from Vogue’s September issue and superimposed them with the photo negatives of his most enigmatic dreams. Ireland does not limit his work to conceptual enigma—he is known for using food and dirty water as casually as he would use acrylics. “Steak-and-kidney pie has thick oils and juices that create an incredible variety of dark, murky browns and light, crispy browns,” . Ireland was the BlackBook Magazine and Society6 New Regime Feature Artist in 2010.
His chimerical illustrations use a combination of traditional techniques and digital modus operandi. His use of pencil is not shy—in fact, the interplay of classic and digital mediums heightens the tension in his portraits. His subjects are in two minds, caught between hyper-reality and illusion, but it is up to us to decide what is more real: the imprecision of handwork, or the retouched digital faces that our modern eyes recognize so easily.
In Greek mythology, Chimera is a fire-breathing female monster with a lion’s head, a goat’s body, and a serpent’s tail, but in contemporary lexicon, chimera means any mythical animal with parts taken from various animals. Ireland adheres to the original Greek meaning by portraying mostly women, but relaxes into the contemporary definition by giving his models bunny ears, ram horns, porcupine spikes, and in the case of the woman from “A Mile Away From Anywhere,” a teapot that sits on her head like a crown. He respects tradition, from his use of pencil to his mythological subject matter, but is not afraid of pushing into unexplored, at times outlandish, territory.
Ireland’s affiliation with Society6, a company that translates artwork into iPhone cases, t-shirts, hangable prints and more, gives his illustrations the chance to be gazed at outside the dense walls of a gallery. Since Ireland’s work has a provocative relevance to daily life, its presence on practical commodities works entirely in his favor—and makes the aficionado sporting his work look quite intriguing.
