Mark Bryan: Surrealism Got Real
- Written by KF Sydney
- Photos & Interview by Ira & Sawa
- Published:
- In Features
Life in the United States has become so absurd that only our surrealists can properly describe it, and so desperate that only our pop artists can spread the message fast enough. So thank God for the pop surrealism of Mark Bryan – or whatever we have where a God should be – “I’m not an atheist, but I’m about as close as you can get. I wouldn’t presume to know what the universe is. I call it the great mystery and we’re just little mammals on one tiny planet in this gigantic, unimaginable, enormous universe. And to sort of have the presumption that you know what’s going on, I don’t think that’s realistic at all.”
He says this from a swivel chair in a studio he built himself, sitting in front of an unfinished painting of monstrous certainty: Trump enthroned atop a war-elephant-shaped battle tank bearing his own face, leading and surrounded by a militarized circus parade comprised of all the battalions and brigades of his MAGA coalition (including a clown-faced southern church tank bearing the Confederate flag, heavily armed Conservative women costumed as majorettes, and a squad of right-wing Supreme Court justices robed like dark wizards) marching triumphantly toward a cliff.
The bright, candystore clarity of Bryan’s work grabs you, but the details are important. Out ahead of the presidential procession, a little Joker’s kicking a globe off the cliff: “I was trying to get this circus, happy vibe and this whole thing is sort of like this giant moving thing, it can’t be stopped, but I painted it so none of them are aware – except the Joker – that they’re about to go off a cliff.”
Since this is a Mark Bryan painting, of course it matters which Joker. “This is the Joker from the recent one with Joaquin Phoenix. And it’s different than the other Joker movies. He’s not like this sort of entertaining diabolical character, he’s a person that’s super fucked up, like mentally ill. And you know, he’s been pushed to a point where nothing matters anymore. And he is just like, ‘Burn it down, fuck it up.’ Y’know? And so, in my mind, he sees this parade coming and thinks, ‘Oh yeah, I just want to be in the front of this thing!’ And he’s aware of the edge, but he doesn’t care. So it’s just the whole earth in front of this gang and he’s just like, ‘Fuck it,’ and he kicks it off the edge of the cliff.”
A Californian and a surfer, there is also something intensely Californian about his specific brand of surrealism. Where else do dreamers make dreams real with such toylike precision and vivid color? “Where these images come from, it is kind of like I’ve always said – dreaming, but while you’re awake. Especially as you work on a painting, you start seeing new things and somehow I get a problem in my head that there’s something I want to make a statement about, and then it might just be germinating in the subconscious for months or whatever. And then I literally do see a picture.”
Looking at all of Bryan’s work, it’s not hard to believe. His paintings have the free-association quality of a man happily tuning in to whatever frequency his internal antenna wants to receive – in The Wig (2009) a pair of skeletons haul a massive, wigged mannequin’s head up a sunny stone slope – and where the head’s face should be there is, instead, a theater-curtained window framing and presenting yet another faceless, wig-wearing head. Unlike Bryan’s political work, interpreting it almost seems beside the point: this is an image that was inside a human mind, and Bryan has a classically surrealist trust in the significance of whatever that might be, and brings it to life with Windsor-McKay-like wonder.
I was just on a death spiral. Making stuff now is a product of me deciding to be alive
But even if Bryan is busy documenting dreams, modern reality shapes those dreams. As he quotes Trotsky’s artist’s statement: “You may not be interested in war but war is interested in you.”
“Many times,” says Bryan, “it’s surprised me. [It’s] mostly the political work that people – in their comments on social media – will say, ‘Thank you for making a picture of how I feel.’ And it didn’t just happen once. That makes me feel good. It’s like, ‘Okay, I’m not alone in how I feel.’”
Indeed, it was the political work that first brought Bryan to prominence: “I’ve been doing political work for many years and did a lot of stuff with the Bush and Cheney era, and I thought, ‘Okay, nothing’s gonna top that.’ But along comes Donald Trump. And it’s like
Cheney on steroids, but not as smart – which is good. And so some people say, ‘Oh, this is a golden age of satirical art.’ And in a way that’s true because there’s literally material every single day that you could work with. But, most of the artists I know would prefer not to have that material and not have to make commentary about things that are upsetting and outrageous. And I’d rather paint, y’know, landscapes and flowers than Donald Trump any day. But I think that not all artists, but a lot of them, are sort of compelled to make commentary about what’s going on in the world. And in my point of view, every slice of history is in all the arts. Not just visual arts, but literature and music and theater and all those things that are making a portrait of that particular time. It’s a discussion with the rest of humanity: ‘Okay, this is what’s happening.’”
Bryan admits that painting “what’s happening” isn’t always easy: “So to think about this stuff and have to look at it for hours and hours…it’s kind of disturbing. When Trump won the election eight years ago, I did that painting of him as a giant octopus covering the White House. And that’s the first time I was like, ‘Oh my God, this guy actually won!’ And I got sick of painting that. I mean, I had to take breaks. But I guess I’ve gotten more used to it.“
Being used to what’s horrible and bizarre is a key idea in Bryan’s art. The shocking and the strange are never presented in shocking or strange ways in these paintings – they are presented as another sideshow in the endlessly eerie wind-up carnival of existence. This shiny fatalism matches Bryan’s own: “My general take is that humans are problematic species and that there’s not gonna be some utopia someday. You know, the shit’s never gonna stop.”
Mark Bryan doesn’t seem to be stopping either, however, he is, as he says, compelled. In a world where facts don’t matter, it may be that dreams count twice as much.
Cheney on steroids, but not as smart – which is good. And so some people say, ‘Oh, this is a golden age of satirical art.’ And in a way that’s true because there’s literally material every single day that you could work with. But, most of the artists I know would prefer not to have that material and not have to make commentary about things that are upsetting and outrageous. And I’d rather paint, y’know, landscapes and flowers than Donald Trump any day. But I think that not all artists, but a lot of them, are sort of compelled to make commentary about what’s going on in the world. And in my point of view, every slice of history is in all the arts. Not just visual arts, but literature and music and theater and all those things that are making a portrait of that particular time. It’s a discussion with the rest of humanity: ‘Okay, this is what’s happening.’”
Bryan admits that painting “what’s happening” isn’t always easy: “So to think about this stuff and have to look at it for hours and hours…it’s kind of disturbing. When Trump won the election eight years ago, I did that painting of him as a giant octopus covering the White House. And that’s the first time I was like, ‘Oh my God, this guy actually won!’ And I got sick of painting that. I mean, I had to take breaks. But I guess I’ve gotten more used to it.“
Being used to what’s horrible and bizarre is a key idea in Bryan’s art. The shocking and the strange are never presented in shocking or strange ways in these paintings – they are presented as another sideshow in the endlessly eerie wind-up carnival of existence. This shiny fatalism matches Bryan’s own: “My general take is that humans are problematic species and that there’s not gonna be some utopia someday. You know, the shit’s never gonna stop.”
Mark Bryan doesn’t seem to be stopping either, however, he is, as he says, compelled. In a world where facts don’t matter, it may be that dreams count twice as much.
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