Ryan Klemek grew up in suburban upstate New York, where there was very little stimulation. To fend off the boredom, one had to develop one of two things: creativity or alcoholism. Fortunately, Ryan developed the former. And even more fortunately, he was in a public school system that valued the arts. In high school Advanced Studio art, Karen Fisher and Susan Stuart taught him everything he would ever learn about observational drawing. They inspired him to go on to art school, and he ended up at the School of the Museum of Fine Art. While he learned very few actual skills here, the Museum School definitely opened his mind. This was also where he would discover Kaiju Big Battel, which would later provide an opportunity for him to combine his love of staged combat with his absurd sense of humor and love of pop culture. During the summer, Ryan worked as a caricature artist for a company known as Fun Enterprises. This type of work helped develop his line control, which would later come in handy for the book illustrations he would do. The painting style featured in the greeting cards started to develop after he finished school. Watercolor was initially chosen for convenience, as it takes less set-up and clean-up time, and there are no dangerous fumes. In addition, watercolor blocks are cheaper than canvas, and paper is much easier to scan for the computer. The use of watercolor gives a children's book illustration quality which completements the absurd and often dark subject matter, and is unique to greeting cards. SEE ARTIST'S PORTFOLIO