Halloween Special: Tyler Thacker

In the week leading up to October 31st, we will be sharing the bone-chilling work of some of our favourite freaky artists, alongside a hair-raisingly festive little interview!

Moving from the bedroom to airplanes, bed bugs have found a new home. A cheaper alternative to sugar, high fructose corn syrup increases the risk of fatty liver disease, obesity, inflammation, and diabetes. Tyler Thacker’s foray into hyper-realism offers an insidious snapshot of the hyper-ominous afterglow of a contemporary zeitgeist’s shelf-life in a capitalist system. Halloween is always a little frightening, sure, but what’s truly terrifying are the reverberating specters of consumers navigating globalization: aka each one of US! Itching, scratching and gouging our way toward an uncertain future. – Rebecca Storm

Is your work intended to induce fear?
That depends on who is looking at my painting.

What are you most afraid of?
Studio fire when I’m not there.

What was your most memorable halloween experience/costume?
Going to a Halloween party at the frank Zappa house with my Pomeranian and mother dressed as me. Think I was dressed as a sad hobo clown. Youthful anti-oedipus.

What is your favourite horror movie and why?

I want to say Hausu, Possession, or maybe Dead Ringers but it has to be universally beloved John Carpenter’s the Thing. Themes around alienation, body dysmorphia, paranoia, and what it means to have a human ego are artfully portrayed within the zenith of analogue creature fx and an excellent score by Morricone. Glad Carpenter didn’t score it himself.

What possesses you to create?
Being too much of a coward to articulate in cogent terms what I really think.

Do you believe in ghosts?
Not in the traditional sense.

Do you believe in magic?
Depends on how you spell it.

Have you ever had any sort of supernatural or paranormal encounter?
I believe so.

Given the choice, would you become immortal?
Yes.

If you were a monster what kind of monster would you be?
One without flesh or time asymmetry.