Skulls by Gustavo Rimada

Recently, I was introduced to Gustavo Rimada’s artwork on Instagram by a friend. It didn’t take me long to lose myself in such a wide variety of artwork, but first I thought I’d tell you a little bit about the artist himself.

Rimada was born in Mexico in 1981 as the youngest of four children to a lawyer father and a doctor mother. According to his earliest memories he was constantly drawing as a child and took art classes at school in Indio, California, where his parents had moved to by the time he was seven-years-old. He later moved to Santa Monica where he attended The Art Institute and studied Computer Animation but left this to pursue a career in the army after 9/11.

He was in the army for three years but put art on the back burner at this point. It was two years after he left the army that he chose to do his art again full-time and started to work at a tattoo shop. Since then he has worked on his art professionally and has only grown as an artist since then.

These were just bits of information that I gleaned from his biography on his website, and I thought it important to include it when talking about his work.

Here is one of his more recent skull tattoos which he posted in March as a piece he used to promote the Spring Sale on his website. It’s quite the trip just looking at this image, with there being so many significant meanings in one picture. So, I thought I’d do a brief breakdown of this one.

The spiders have the faces of tragedy and comedy on their bottom segments, and the fact that these are on spiders makes it all the more disturbing. Although, that may just be the arachnophobe in me. The spider can also represent patience and persistence, so the spiders themselves aren’t just there to look cool.

Next, there’s the third eye. Obviously, the third eye usually has to do with hidden insight, but then there’s the fact that it’s in a star. It’s considerably unusual when you consider that we see the eye in the triangle, due to the Eye of Providence. Personally, the fact that it’s in a maze as well may have something to do with the mysteries of the mind, and how no one’s experience is exactly the same.

Then, of course, there are the roses, both red and pink. Of course, the red roses are defining passion, but then there are the pink roses that have much gentler and sympathetic connotations than their counterparts.

This is a pure showing of life and what makes it. It presents the light and darkness everyone faces daily. There’s so much meaning that I’ll leave you with this analysis or I may go on all day.

So, here are some other images from Rimada’s Instagram.

 

He did this one for a Fables Inspired art show in New York a few years ago. It’s safe to say I don’t need to go into too much detail about this one, but it’s got some pretty good twists with the wolf silhouette in the background.

Then let’s not forget Granny at the bottom of the painting with only her glasses left. I’m a huge fan of Grimm’s Fairy Tales, so this one’s a good one for me.

 

This painting was done in November 2017 for a Mausoleum Show for Just Another Gallery and as a huge fan of skull and crossbones and Jolly Roger themed work in general, this one’s a piece that caught my eye. He’s incorporated the eye of providence again, and with the blackbird’s wings, you can see the mausoleum theme.

These are just a small selection of Rimada’s art, and I would recommend checking out his other work on Instagram, and his website. His Instagram regularly includes his works in progress, and he posts pretty frequently so there’s always a new range of material to look at.