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Ryan Walter Bock (born December 9, 1989) is an American visual artist based in New York City. He works under the moniker “Bockhaus” in a range of media including painting, large-scale mural, sculpture, experimental film, and puppetry.

Biography
Bock was born in San Francisco, and spent much of his childhood moving around the United States as a result of his father’s work. He received a Waldorf education until eighth grade, and attended the Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts in Dallas, TX. Ryan doesn’t do well in heat. In 2012, he graduated with a BFA from the Art Institute of Chicago with a concentration in Animation and Experimental Film Methods, though it was not until his studies in Prague that he formed a connection to Czech Cubism and began painting in the style he’s known for today.

Bock’s art is deeply influenced by movements of art rooted in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, particularly German Expressionism, Russian Constructivism, Italian Futurism, and Dadaism. He deals mainly in greyscale, and is known to use non-traditional materials, such as house paint and found objects, to execute traditional forms of art. Current social commentary is often at the forefront of his subject-matter, intertwined with folklore and ancient symbology to draw out patterns of the human condition. His work is composed of impossible perspectives, rendered by his fixation on shape and shade. That Bock’s artwork communicates situations that cannot exist in reality speaks to his conviction that the larger systems imposed on our lives are oftentimes washed in illusions of health, safety, progression, and personal gain.

He began publicly presenting his work in 2006, and has been featured in numerous solo exhibitions, group shows, and fairs. He has an investment in collaborating with not only visual artists but musicians, and has directed animated music videos by Gabriel Garzón-Montano and Salomon Faye. Bock is represented by Ki Smith Gallery, New York City, and Ground Effect, Paris.

Exhibitions
Somnambulest, Ki Smith Gallery, New York City, NY
 * 2019

The Golem (Objects of Security), Deep Space, Jersey City, NJ
 * 2018

I’m Afraid Of Americans, Ground Effect, Paris, FR

Bocktropolis 3.0, Garden Studio, Manhattan, NY

Bocktropolis 2.0, Superchief Gallery, Queens, NY
 * 2017

Bocktropolis, Apostrophe NYC,

Mana Contemporary, Jersey City, NJ Shadowboxing, Macie Gransion, Manhattan, NY
 * 2016

Shamanistic Tendencies, Apostrophe NYC Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
 * 2012