Cautious

The original is sold. This is a 50 x 50 cm canvas. I started with acrylic airbrush to create a mystical background, and then I attacked it with oil paint. I always pay attention, wondering how it’s going to turn out, even if I have a photo reference. It never looks like the photo because it mirrors how I am feeling at the time of painting. Painting these faces is somewhat like therapy, helping me understand how I am feeling.

Ryan Louder is a London-based artist known for his vivid, hallucinatory paintings inspired by real-time REM intrusion episodes a neurological phenomenon linked to his narcolepsy. Diagnosed at Guy's Hospital, this rare condition causes dream states to bleed into waking life, allowing Ryan to capture surreal visions as they unfold. His work explores the threshold between consciousness and imagination, often layering "images within images" to evoke shifting realities and altered perception.

Ryan's practice merges visual storytelling with neurodivergent insight-transforming a medical anomaly into a portal of constant creativity.