Ron English

Ron English was born in Houston, Texas, in 1960 and currently lives and works in New Jersey. Known as the "father of Street Art," he explores popular imagery and contemporary communication. “I belong to the second generation of those who followed the Pop Art School of the 1960s. And I believe I am correct, when reflecting on my works, to say that New Pop should always strive to disseminate social messages. Playful, cartoonish, but above all uncomfortable for the untouchables of global power,” as seen in the piece Clown Coulrophobic, which has been in the Iannaccone collection since 2011.

As an artist of POPaganda, his brand is adaptable to various environments, from suburban bridges to elegant gallery spaces, without losing its impact. He began by subverting billboards, achieving his goal of combating globalization through globalization itself. He forces people to reflect: replacing the word “Camel” with “Cancer.” Against Apple, which advertises the Mac, he juxtaposes the slogan “Think Different” with the face of Charles Manson, the infamous perpetrator of the Bel Air massacre. In a critique of George W. Bush, he overlays a personal reinterpretation of Picasso's Guernica, crowded with characters from Walt Disney, onto a poster featuring the phrase “New World Order,” which he pronounced regarding the Gulf War.

“An icon. And Pop Art has always fed on icons. Anyone observing the Picasso fresco thinks of war: absolute, definitive, iconic. In my case, revisiting the masterpiece displayed at the Reina Sofia in Madrid (I have created 60, each one different), I narrate power conflicts: Walt Disney cartoons battling against Warner Bros 'cartoons,' for example. Or Snoopy, in the guise of the Red Baron, unleashing a war against the other Peanuts from aboard a plane of the Fascist Legionary Aviation.”