Surrealism Gallery Press Kit · 2026
Media & Press Kit
Surreal,
Visionary,
Fantastic.
An online gallery dedicated to surrealist and visionary art — from classical masters to contemporary voices across every medium and continent.
672+ Artist Profiles
215+ Image Collections
100 Years of Surrealism
∞ Creative Styles
About
The Gallery
Surrealism Gallery is an online destination dedicated to showcasing the full breadth of surrealist and visionary art — a living, growing archive that spans continents, centuries, and mediums. The gallery brings together classical surrealists, pop-surrealist provocateurs, digital collage artists, ceramic sculptors, and everything in between under one curated roof.
The collection covers the roots of the movement — born from André Breton's 1924 Manifesto — through to artists working today in Bangkok, Belgrade, Seoul, and San Francisco. Every profile pairs carefully researched biographical context with a rich visual gallery, giving visitors and writers a single authoritative resource for discovering artists who operate at the intersection of dream and reality.
Surrealism Gallery actively invites artist submissions and curator inquiries. It serves a global audience of collectors, writers, academics, and admirers who believe that the strangeness of the inner world deserves to be taken seriously.
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Surrealism Gallery is an online gallery devoted to surrealist, visionary, and fantastic art. With more than 672 artist profiles — spanning classical surrealists to contemporary digital artists working across painting, collage, photography, ceramics, and film — it is one of the most comprehensive free resources for the surrealist tradition on the web. The gallery covers movements and voices from more than a century of surrealism, from André Breton's 1924 founding manifesto through today's pop-surrealist painters and handcrafted photomontage artists. Visitors and researchers can browse curated artist biographies, exhibition histories, and image galleries in a single destination. For artist submissions and press inquiries, visit surrealismgallery.com.
Numbers
Key Facts & Figures
672+
Artist Profiles
And growing — submissions accepted year-round
215+
Image Collections
Curated artwork sets per artist
40+
Countries
Artists represented from 6 continents
1924
Movement Founded
André Breton's Surrealist Manifesto
100+
Years of Surrealism
Classical through contemporary
20+
Style Categories
From Fantastic Art to Digital Photomontage
1000s
Artworks Featured
Paintings, collage, sculpture, film & more
Free
Always
No paywalls — open to all
∞
The Imagination
The only true limit
Roster
Featured Artists
A selection of highlighted profiles from the gallery's roster. The full directory of 672+ profiles is available at surrealismgallery.com.
| Artist | Origin | Bio | Style |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alice Zilberberg | Tallinn, Estonia | Alice Zilberberg is an internationally acclaimed, award-winning conceptual art photographer and visual artist specializing in surreal photo-manipulation. Born in Tallinn, Estonia in the former Soviet Union, she was raised in Israel, moved to Canada, and now resides in Tel Aviv. A graduate of Toronto Metropolitan University’s (formerly Ryerson University) Photography program, she began her artistic practice with painting and drawing from a young age, later fusing photography with digital manipulation to create digital paintings that blend reality and fantasy, echoing surrealism and baroque art. Her meticulous process involves global travel for elements, compositing multiple photographs, color toning, manipulation, and painting, with works taking months to complete, exploring themes of nature, the human condition, emotionality, personal identity, female empowerment, and mindfulness. | |
| Aof Smith | Nakhon Si Thammarat, Thailand | Aof Smith is a Bangkok-based contemporary artist known for his pop-surrealist paintings featuring ethereal characters like the 'Furry,' inspired by manga, anime, science fiction, 90s culture, and personal experiences from his youth. Born in Nakhon Si Thammarat, southern Thailand, he was exposed to art from childhood through his father, an art teacher, and has been creating bizarre visual realms since then. He earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Chulalongkorn University in 2009 and a Master of Fine Arts from King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology Ladkrabang (KMITL) in 2013, becoming a full-time artist thereafter with 16 years of experience as of recent interviews. | |
| Eric White 1968 | Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States | Eric White is an American contemporary artist born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, known for his hyperrealist paintings that blend surrealism, pop culture references, and cinematic elements. His work features disrupted, dream-like scenes with bizarre figures, drawing from 20th-century film, music album covers, and influences like Hollywood classics, film noir, David Lynch's Twin Peaks, and Richard Hamilton's Beatles artwork. White initially worked as an illustrator for bands like Korn and Incubus before transitioning to fine art, with notable commissions including Tyler, The Creator’s album cover in 2017. He explores themes of dysfunctional psychology, synthetic reality, and dimensions beyond ordinary perception through meticulously crafted figurative paintings that are both nostalgic and dystopian. | |
| Gunyoung Kim | Seoul, South Korea | Gunyoung Kim is a ceramic sculptor born and raised in Seoul, South Korea. She earned her BFA in Ceramics from Kook-Min University (2010) and her MFA in Ceramic Art from The Ohio State University (2014). Kim creates "mischievous and magical beings, embracing both the glittering and dark of her mind." She states: "I am interested in looking at a side of humanity that is subtle and spiritual." | |
| Hans Ruedi Giger 1940–2014 | Chur, Switzerland | Hans Ruedi Giger, known as H.R. Giger, was a Swiss artist renowned for his biomechanical art style that fused human anatomy with mechanical elements, often evoking horror and surrealism. Born in Chur, Switzerland, in 1940, he initially studied architecture and industrial design at the School of Applied Arts in Zurich from 1962 to 1965 or 1970, while working as an architectural draughtsman and designer. Developing a unique freehand airbrush technique influenced by fantastic realism artists, Giger held his first solo exhibition in 1964 and gained recognition through poster publications starting in 1969 and books like Necronomicon (1977). His work extended to sculpture, furniture, and immersive environments such as the Giger Bars in Gruyères and Chur. | |
| Jarosław Kukowski 1972 | Tczew, Poland | Jarosław Kukowski is a Polish contemporary painter born on April 11, 1972, in Tczew, Poland. He began painting in his youth and made his public debut in 1994 at the Gdansk 'Stara Laznia' Gallery. His works explore moral and social themes, including death, elapsing time, and human nature, often aiming to provoke deep emotional responses from viewers. Critics identify three phases in his career: early works featuring dramatic symbolism, deformed figures, and surreal landscapes known as 'non-dreams' or 'undreams'; a middle phase of 'frescos' depicting time's passage with layered, deteriorating surfaces; and recent 'undreams' marked by surrealism, irony, and provocation. In 2001, some works were removed from an exhibition due to audience backlash. | |
| Jeffrey Michael Harp | Jeffrey Michael Harp is a contemporary artist specializing in Victorian Surrealism, known for his imaginative and surreal works that blend Victorian aesthetics with surrealist elements. He is featured in prominent surreal art collectives and platforms dedicated to promoting modern surrealist artists. His style has garnered recognition within the surrealism community, positioning him as an active figure in the contemporary surreal art scene. | ||
| Lee Harvey Roswell | San Francisco, California | Lee Harvey Roswell is a self-taught surrealist artist based in San Francisco. His work blends angst and humor with themes exploring death, entropy, and existential struggle. The artist's style combines slapstick elements with nightmarish imagery, creating pieces that are simultaneously mocking and melancholic. His work is collected and exhibited internationally. | |
| Ljubomir Ljuba Popović 1934–2016 | Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina | Ljubomir 'Ljuba' Popović was a renowned Serbian surrealist painter born on October 14, 1934, in Tuzla, Bosnia (then Yugoslavia). He spent his childhood in Valjevo, Serbia, and began his artistic studies at the Academy of Applied Arts in Belgrade in 1953, though he was expelled in 1957 due to his unconventional style. Supported by mentor Marko Čelebonović, he resumed studies at the Academy of Fine Arts, graduating in 1959, followed by a specialized course with Milo Milunović. A pivotal 1959 visit to Paris exposed him to a surrealist exhibition, profoundly influencing his work. In 1960, he founded the 'Mediala' movement, exploring themes of desire and fear. Popović moved permanently to Paris in 1963, where he gained rapid recognition from gallerists like Marcel Zerbib and Thessa Herold, integrating into the surrealist scene and producing fantastical, erotic paintings reminiscent of Salvador Dalí, inspired by Renaissance, Baroque art, and personal experiences like his grandfather's exorcisms.[1][2][3][4][5] | |
| Mark Hopkins 1959 | Poughkeepsie, United States | Mark Hopkins is a contemporary surrealist painter born in Poughkeepsie, New York, in 1959. He earned a BA in liberal arts from St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota, in 1981. His career spans extensive international travel and work in Asia, including studies in Japan, Taiwan, Thailand, Burma, and Mainland China from 1981-1992. He worked as a scene painter in Minneapolis for the Minnesota Opera, Tyrone Guthrie Theater, and film projects like Bruce Springsteen's 'Dancing in the Dark' from 1982-1987. In Thailand (1987-1995), he served as an adjunct professor at Chiang Mai University and directed the 6-Pole House cultural cabaret. Later periods included Bali (1995-1997) for freelance illustration and advertising, and Singapore (1997-1999) as CEO of Spikeart Productions. Since 1999, he has been based in Poughkeepsie, NY, founding Mark Hopkins Murals and Faux Finishes, focusing on murals, portraiture, and surreal paintings.[2][4][5] | |
| Mark Ryden 1963 | Medford, Oregon, United States | Mark Ryden, born January 20, 1963, in Medford, Oregon, and raised in Southern California, is an American painter and illustrator widely recognized as the godfather of Pop Surrealism. He earned a BFA from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena in 1987 and initially worked as a commercial illustrator, designing album covers for artists including Michael Jackson's 'Dangerous,' Red Hot Chili Peppers' 'One Hot Minute,' and Aerosmith's 'Love in an Elevator.' His transition to fine art began with the groundbreaking 1998 solo exhibition 'The Meat Show' at Mendenhall Gallery in Pasadena, which featured surreal juxtapositions of raw meat, childlike figures, and religious elements, establishing his signature style blending old master techniques with pop culture icons, kitsch, mysticism, and unsettling narratives. | |
| Nicola Samorì 1977 | Forlì, Italy | Nicola Samorì is an Italian contemporary artist born in 1977 in Forlì, Italy, known for his figurative paintings and sculptures that reinterpret 17th-century Baroque and Renaissance techniques with a modern, provocative twist. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Bologna in 2004, where he honed his skills in painting and sculpture. His work explores themes of beauty, decay, physicality, and the dissolution of form, often 'skinning' or altering classical images to reveal inner layers, creating haunting, theatrical pieces that challenge traditional art representations. Samorì lives and works in Bagnacavallo, Italy, and has gained international acclaim for blending historical mastery with contemporary iconoclasm, focusing on motifs like saints, martyrs, portraits, and still lifes.[1][2][3][4] | |
| Richard Smith | Winston-Salem, North Carolina | Richard J. Smith is a self-taught graphic artist based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, with 20+ years of professional experience. He creates surrealist photomontages by combining elements from nature, everyday objects, commissioned photography, and travel scenes into cohesive compositions. Smith's distinctive approach involves all photography and editing via smartphone, which he terms "Handcrafted Surrealism." | |
| Salvador Dalí 1904–1989 | Figueres, Spain | Salvador Dalí, born Salvador Felipe Jacinto Dalí y Domenech on May 11, 1904, in Figueres, Spain, was a prominent Spanish Surrealist artist known for his eccentric personality and dreamlike paintings. Encouraged in art from childhood, he studied at the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando in Madrid but was expelled twice—once in 1923 for criticizing teachers and inciting a riot, and again in 1926 for declaring faculty incompetent to examine him. In the late 1920s, Dalí moved to Paris, where he associated with Pablo Picasso, René Magritte, Joan Miró, and joined the Surrealist group in 1929, becoming one of its leading figures with works exploring the subconscious influenced by Sigmund Freud. | |
| Sammy Slabbinck 1977 | Bruges, Belgium | Sammy Slabbinck is a Belgian contemporary artist born in 1977, renowned for his surrealist-inspired collages that combine found vintage imagery from mid-century magazines and books with modern compositional techniques. He cuts, redistributes, and juxtaposes these images to play with scale, distortion, proportion, and context, often creating humorous or absurd scenes reminiscent of 1950s advertising and Pop Art. His work explores surreal themes by placing characters out of context, blending traditional archetypes with modern ideals, and employs muted tones for engaging, memorable compositions. Slabbinck also produces illustrations, prints, videos, and stop-motion animations for personal projects, brands, and music clips. | |
| Sarolta Bán 1982 | Budapest, Hungary | Sarolta Bán is a Hungarian contemporary artist born in 1982 in Budapest, where she continues to live and work. Originally trained as a jewellery designer, she transitioned to digital photo manipulation around 2007 after experimenting with editing photos from her small digital camera, finding it a fun and limitless creative outlet similar to compounding materials in jewellery making. Self-taught, she combines ordinary elements into surreal compositions using up to 100 layers in software, creating open-ended narratives that invite personal interpretation, often featuring edgy, high-contrast imagery with strong lighting. | |
| Tetsuya Ishida 1973–2005 | Yaizu, Japan | Tetsuya Ishida was a Japanese contemporary painter renowned for his surrealist depictions of modern Japanese society, focusing on themes of isolation, consumerism, workplace anxieties, and urban alienation during Japan's economic recession in the 1990s and early 2000s. Born in Yaizu, Shizuoka Prefecture, he developed an early interest in art inspired by Ben Shahn's illustrations of the 1954 Lucky Dragon Incident exhibited in 1981. Ishida studied visual communication design at Musashino Art University, graduating in 1996 amid the 'Lost Decade' economic crisis, which profoundly influenced his work portraying dehumanization, the 'employment ice age,' and the erosion of individuality in salaryman culture. | |
| Toshiko Okanoue 1928 | Kochi, Japan | Toshiko Okanoue, born in 1928 in Kochi Prefecture, Japan, and raised in Tokyo, emerged as a key figure in Japan's post-war Surrealist movement through her innovative photo-collages. While studying design at Bunka Gakuin in 1950, she began experimenting with chigiri-e, a traditional Japanese technique of torn paper images, and accidentally discovered photo-collage by incorporating clippings from imported Western fashion magazines like Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, and Life. Her dreamlike compositions juxtaposed body parts, animals, and objects, initially created in isolation from European avant-garde traditions until mentor Shuzo Takiguchi introduced her to Max Ernst's work in 1952, enriching her style. | |
| Travis Louie 1964 | Queens, New York, United States | Travis Louie is an American pop surrealist and lowbrow artist born on August 23, 1964, in Queens, New York, to Chinese parents. As a child, he was fascinated by science fiction movies, haunted houses, ghost stories, and animals. He graduated with a BFA in Communication Design from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn in 1990 and initially worked as a freelance illustrator throughout the 1990s before transitioning to fine art painting around 2003. Louie's artistic practice is deeply influenced by his experiences as an Asian American subjected to racism and bullying during the 1970s, as well as his childhood observations of vintage family photographs in his friends' homes—a contrast to the lack of documented history in his own Chinese-American family. This personal history informs his creation of an imaginary world populated by human oddities, mythical beings, and otherworldly characters. His work addresses themes of identity, remembrance, xenophobia, and the immigrant experience through meticulously crafted portraits that reference Victorian and Edwardian photographic traditions. Louie's paintings originate from small drawings and writings in his journals, which he translates onto larger surfaces using acrylic paint over tight graphite drawings. His visual style is influenced by German Expressionism and Film Noir cinema. He relocated from Queens and Chinatown to the Hudson Valley in the late 1990s, seeking isolation for creative contemplation, while continuing to teach at the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan. His work has been exhibited internationally and is held in collections across the United States and Europe. | |
| Valeriu Buev | Valeriu Buev is a Moldovan painter and book designer known for his surrealistic works that explore the human condition through distortion, imagination, and visual metaphor. He studied fine arts for five years at Krasnodar State University in Russia, earning a diploma in painting and book design, and took extension courses in book design at the Moscow Paleographic Institute. Buev began his career in 1979 as a book designer at the 'Stiinta' publishing house, then worked from 1980 to 1991 at 'Cartea Moldoveneasca,' where he illustrated over 350 books, designed booklets, posters, and cards, and won a Silver Prize in Moldova's annual book-design competition. Since late 1991, he has worked as a freelance artist and is a member of the Association Internationale des Arts Plastiques. In 2006, he published a book of short stories and poems. | ||
| Victo Ngai 1988 | Hong Kong | Victo Ngai, born in Hong Kong in 1988, is a renowned digital illustrator currently based in Los Angeles. As the only child of middle-class parents—her father in finance and her mother in roles including professor of Chinese literature, newspaper editor, and investment manager—she spent much of her childhood alone due to her parents' long work hours and frequent family moves. Drawing became her solace, where she created characters and stories, fostering her early interest in line work influenced by Asian arts, including Japanese woodblock prints. She graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) in 2010, the only school she applied to, studying editorial illustration under mentor Chris Buzelli, whose connections helped build her portfolio with publications like The New Yorker and The New York Times before graduation. | |
| Virginia Stewart 1952 | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States | Virginia Stewart was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on October 25, 1952, and is a contemporary artist currently residing in Phoenixville, PA. She has pursued art throughout her lifetime, aligning with the category of Contemporary Surrealism, though specific details on her career trajectory, education, and professional milestones are limited in available records. Her work is not extensively documented in the provided sources, but she maintains an online presence through her website showcasing her artistic endeavors. | |
| Volodymyr Manzhos (WAONE) 1981 | Bohdanivka, Ukraine | Volodymyr Manzhos, known as WAONE, is a Ukrainian contemporary artist born near Kyiv in the early 1980s. Growing up in a home filled with art books, Orthodox icons, and Soviet-era illustrations collected by his father, he developed an early passion for art around age 4 or 5. Starting in 1999 with graffiti tagging as part of the Ingenious Kids crew in Kyiv, he transitioned to large-scale murals by 2003 in collaboration with artist Aec, forming the duo Interesni Kazki ('Interesting Fairy Tales') in 2005. Their surreal, fairy-tale-inspired murals, characterized by intricate details, smooth gradients, and fantastical narratives, appeared worldwide from Mexico to Australia over the next decade.[1][3][4] | |
| Zdzisław Beksiński 1929–2005 | Sanok, Poland | Zdzisław Beksiński was a renowned Polish painter, photographer, sculptor, and digital artist known for his dystopian surrealist works depicting nightmarish landscapes, decay, skeletons, and deformed figures. Born in Sanok, Poland, he endured World War II during his childhood and studied architecture at Kraków University of Technology (also known as Kraków Polytechnic), graduating in 1952. He worked briefly as a construction site supervisor and bus designer, jobs he despised, before dedicating himself to art in the mid-1950s without formal artistic training. Beksiński gained early recognition for his innovative montage photography, including participation in the groundbreaking 1957 'Closed Exhibition' with Lewczyński and Schlabs, and transitioned to detailed drawings, sculptures, and oil paintings on masonite around 1970. |
Coverage
Art Categories
Classical Surrealism
Rooted in Breton's 1924 movement — automatism, dream logic, and the unconscious translated into paint, sculpture, and print.
Pop Surrealism / Lowbrow
The post-1970s movement marrying pop culture, cartoon aesthetics, and subversive subject matter. Ryden, English, and a global wave of heirs.
Fantastic & Visionary Art
Otherworldly, mythological, and metaphysical imagery — Beksiński's dystopias, Giger's biomechanics, and the wider tradition of the fantastic.
Collage & Photomontage
Found imagery remixed, scaled, and recontextualized — from hand-cut paper collages to smartphone-produced digital photomontages.
Digital & Generative Art
Artists using Photoshop, digital photography, and software tools to produce surrealist work native to the screen.
Ceramics & Sculpture
Three-dimensional surrealism — from Gunyoung Kim's ceramic beings to figurative sculptors exploring the boundary between object and creature.
Film & Performance
Cinematic surrealism — Jodorowsky's hallucinatory films, Eric White's Hitchcockian stills, and surrealism extended into time-based media.
Dark & Horror Surrealism
Where surrealism meets dread — nightmarish imagery, existential themes, and the aesthetics of the uncanny.
Brand Identity
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Surrealism
The unconscious mind
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Surreal, imaginative, fantastic + visionary art across every medium and century.
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Pop Surrealism · Featured Artist · 2026
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Reach Out
Media Contact
What we welcome
- Feature requests and editorial collaborations
- Artist submission and profile correction requests
- Licensing questions for editorial image use
- Academic or research partnership inquiries
- Exhibition and event cross-promotion
- Press access to artist data and gallery statistics