Mark Ryden (born January 20, 1963) is an American painter. Ryden is one of the most well known artists of the Pop Surrealist movement, an underground, pop-culture-infused art scene with its origins in 1970s Southern California. He was dubbed “the god-father of pop surrealism” by Interview Magazine. Ryden’s aesthetic is developed from subtle amalgams of many sources: from Ingres, David and other French classicists to Little Golden Books.
