Johnny Ryan's utterly unpretentious taboo-tackling is an infectious and hilarious bombardment of political incorrectness, taking full advantage of the medium's absurdist potential for maximum laughs. In an age when the medium is growing up and aspiring to more mature and hoity-toity literary heights, Ryan builds on the visceral tradition that cartooning has had on our collective funny bone for over a century. Johnny was born in Boston, Massachusetts and grew up in shitty Plymouth, just a mile away from the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Plant. He now lives in Los Angeles with his wife.

"Generally speaking, [Johnny Ryan's] comics are really dumb & infantile, and prove beyond a doubt that chemical pollution, television, video games, pop music, etc. is making us all stupider by the minute..." – R. Crumb

SP: The work is a barrage of symbols and signs. It’s dense stuff that also seems fit to just be “in the moment”, not only as some mutilation of the bizarre nature of things but also embracing the ways of seeing to varying degrees. You know, as drawings, comics strip and other visual forms. My current works are like celebrations to living at the start of a very weird age.

My conceptual framework hurtles into these different directions and they always seem organic and mine. I’m producing floorshows and farewell concerts with the FRIENDSHIP FRIENDS FOREVER (rainbow band), making videos under the TELEVISION FOR GHOSTS / 2084 FLOORSHOW umbrella, and making images that relay the totemic themes behind all the other work. I shuffle around in formats but the big difference is how close they are to me, personally.

Before I moved to SF I was just a writer, and words just made so much sense to me. Then they seemed phony, manipulative and limited in a world with hypertext in it, a world with so much goddamn subtext to what was lurking under in it’s big storm of changes, in its unconscious birthing of memes. Words were meaningless in the face of the connections between them, in the changing face of how books were produced, in the questions concerning the changes in information retrieval itself. This was big to me - the new ways of experiencing “stuff”, from how we communicated these changes to the part that images play with culture and memory. So I went from writing dialogues to making data maps.

Then I got into imagery again, especially the Medusa, the representation of the incomprehensible. That’s what got me into The Tormentors – relationships - the walls between things breaking down. It was car crashes. Have you ever seen one? It's like that Raymond Carver story "Popular Mechanics", it's a raw moment of chance and horrible corrupted beauty. Things change irrevocably. Well, the drawings... They're my landscape of these feelings - the innate vile beauty of car crashes, the taste of sweat, the medusa's gaze, sexual fantasies, self representation, time and memory - that whole gag. What's the personal side of a good sinner?

SP: Hey man, are you going put some cool hyperlinks?

SP: It’ll make it all so much clearer.

SP: Cool.

I was born in Santarém, Portugal and moved to Lisbon one year later. I grew up in a middle-class suburbs on the south side of Lisbon. I remember feeling like a bit of an outsider as a kid. I started getting involved in graffiti and skateboarding and hanging around in the street with my friends and creating all sorts of different things. I have also been very lucky and had many opportunities to travel beginning at a very young age.

I currently live near the Beach in the south side of Lisbon (Caparica) but I have my studio in the centre of Lisbon where I spend most of my time.

My new show is inspired by all things Kawaii and my love for Japan. Kawaii is a Japanese term that means supreme saturated cuteness, delicious adorable things. When I see something that is Kawaii, I get a warm feeling in my tummy and I want it and must have it!

The show is very influenced by my trips to Japan. I love all the amazing fashions I saw there on the street. I love the toys, advertisements, food, charms, gardens and I love the people! The first time I heard the term “Kawaii” was when a girl on the street in Tokyo pointed at one of my heart candy tattoos on my arm and said, “kawaii, kawaii!!” I right away asked my friend who is studying in Japan what that meant, and I loved the idea of it. I have been working on this show for over a year now and I have never felt so strongly about paintings or a subject.

Aiyana Udesen: FCA is three kids that draw for a living and don't have bosses. We make sure that none of us is slacking off.

Aiyana Udesen: A package of unfinished art ends up on our doorstep. We decide how to screw it up and then send it back.

Aiyana Udesen: They always have the same name. Future Colors of America.