Düsseldorf, 1984 (Germany)

The German Street art artist Van Ray grew up under the influence of the Parisian “Pochoir Movement” during the Eighties in the West German city of Duesseldorf.

As a result of this early force of this kind of art, which prevalent implicates art as an expression of social criticism in public, he began to express his own view of society with the help of Graffiti. Due to personal maturation and developed abilities to deal with ubiquitous social and political problems of Western society Van Ray broadened his artistic on-hand skills by redeveloping methods like using stencils, stickers, paste-ups, and sculptures. This incremental development is also reflected in his public work.

On the basis of his so far mastered artistic skills Van Ray was supervised in drawing and painting by the well-known Susanne Ristow, this extensive process didn’t prevent him from simultaneous 3D animation and visualization experiments.

As a result of a personal wrap in 2007, accompanied by a movement to Cologne, Van Ray took this opportunity to establish the artist collaboration “fancy room” which could be seen as an elaborate try to create a symbiosis of design and street art. The results were used by several textile manufacturers as part of their products. Van Ray started simultaneously to offer general public access to mainly printed work through exhibitions.

Nowadays Van Ray’s work reflects a fusion of Street art, Pop art, and qualified nonsense, retaining the basic elements of his distinctive artistic style without losing sight of his intended social criticism. His recent work makes use of various techniques (Aerosol paint, Acrylic painting, Collage, and Décollage) on wooden slats or iron sheets. These arrangements can be contemplated in galleries as well in Germany and China.