EIP: When did you first pick up a paintbrush, and what inspired you to do so?
RIDIKKULUZ: When I was kid I’d spend summers in Jordan and my cousin Fadi, who was also an artist, would give me a blank canvas to mess around with as he worked on his Oum Khalthoum paintings. He showed me the essence of being an Arab painter: painting, cigarettes, whiskey while Fairouz was playing in the background. It sounded like a good life, so I followed suit.
EIP: How do you feel your ballroom experience has influenced your work as an artist?
RIDIKKULUZ: Voguing has broken my heteronormative routine and has been the catalyst for healing and comfortability in my queerness. It correlates with my painting medium and has taught me that technique is not what is most important. The real creativity is in being your most authentic version of yourself, telling a story, and engaging with the viewer. This has completely changed how I paint. My focus is to make people “feel it” or in other words evoke in the viewer the same emotion as the figure they are viewing.
EIP: Does being queer play into your work ?
RIDIKKULUZ: The practice I am developing is a personal story, a documentation of my life experiences as an Arab queer individual. I will say this. I do think Art is “mad gay.” Art “making” may not necessarily be, but when you start fidgeting and playing with your work like a stylist— that’s gay. Colors:gay. Textures:gay. In the beginning, I was more of an Antonio Lopez type of gay than I was a Lucien Freud. I subconsciously followed the route of gay portrait artists who were consumed by aesthetics—fashion really. Sometimes art tries to be fashion and sometimes fashion tries to be art. Abstract Paintings— fashion. Nude bodies lying with no purpose— fashion. But I wanted to create art that means something, and I think that caused a shift in my work.
EIP: Is there a specific place in the world that has given you the greatest artistic inspiration?
RIDIKKULUZ: New York Baby!
EIP: Tell us about your journey and identity as a painter ; style wise and also inspiration-wise?
RIDIKKULUZ: My multi-disciplinary practice is on the journey to total and unapologetic self-expression. I point out delivery systems of grief, friendship, and self-reflection mixed with conflicting themes of Queerness and Arab iconography. Within this, I intersect these layers of identity so they coexist harmoniously. Whether it be bridging the gap between the east and the west, the straights and the gays, or me and the world- I investigate the human condition, the parts we play, and how identity evolves and hides. EIP: Style wise & inspiration wise– I love Davinci for technique, Kara Walker for storytelling, De Lacroix for color palette, Caspar David Friedrich for depth, Serwan Beran for intensity, Willy Ninja for drama, Goya for composition, and Marwan Kassab Bachi for human investigation.
Documentation courtesy of Em Joseph/Joseph Joseph Studio
