Chet Zar – Painter of the Dark

This fine artist is well known for his dark, and often humorous imageries. With an interest in horror films and art, he eventually embarked on a career as a special effect artist, designer and sculptor and did the movies, “The Ring”, “Hellboy”, “Planet of the Apes” and was the art director for various music videos for the metal band, Tool.

His influences came from James Zar(his step father), Beksinski, H.R. Giger, Frank Frazetta, M. C. Escher, Bosch, John Singer Sargent and Norman Rockwell just to name a few.

What he thinks about his art works?

“The characters i paint may seem like creatures from another dimension, but i think they are simply us, here and now. Modern humanity without it’s masks, without the adornments that make us acceptable to whatever group we are a part of. From the straight laced conservative to the tattooed, anti-social rebel,  we all cover up to fit in someplace . Yet the only place where we are truly the same is on the inside. We all share feelings of fear and loneliness. We feel ugly and insecure. We feel separate from our environment and each other. These are the feelings that i try to convey in my paintings. These are the feelings that connect us.” -Chet Zar

How true and insightful!

Don’t know much about this guy’s life experiences, but i LOOOOOOOOOVE his works. Came across him in a tattoo magazine, can’t remember which one. But this guy is awesome. Awesome awesome awesome!

check out more of his works here.