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Chet Zar  Monrovia, CA


* All images used with permission. Please do not distribute without first contacting the artist.


About Chet


Zar’s interest in the darker side of art began in the earliest stages of his life. A natural fascination with all things strange combined with a short period of early family problems fostered within himself a deep connection to horror movies and dark imagery. He could relate to the feelings of fear, anxiety and isolation that they conveyed. These are themes which had permeated most of his childhood drawings and paintings and are reflected in his work to this day

The combined interest in horror films and art eventually culminated into a career as a special effects make up artist, designer and sculptor for the motion picture industry, designing and creating creatures and make up effects effects for such films as, “The Ring”, “Hellboy”, “Planet of the Apes” and the critically acclaimed music videos for the art metal band, Tool. For the last decade Zar has also embraced the digital side of special effects as well, utitlizing the computer to translate his dark vision with 3D animation for Tool’s live shows and subsequently releasing many of them on his own DVD of dark 3D animation, “Disturb the Normal”.

But the many years spent dealing with all of the politics and artistic compromises of the film industry left Zar feeling creatively stagnant. At the beginning of 2000 (at the suggestion of horror author Clive Barker), he decided to go back to his roots and focus on his own original works and try his hand at fine art, specifically painting in oils. The result has been a renewed sense of purpose, artistic freedom and a clarity of vision that is evident in his darkly surreal (and often darkly humorous), paintings.


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Chet appears in the following Top 10 lists


'Eye Contact'

'Twitterers'

'California'

'2008'

'Redheads'


10 of 26 reactions displayed


"amazingly creepy. Nice job."

"too much lord of the rings?"

"ooook? my cousin would not sleep for MONTHS if she saw the clown 1 she is terrified of them! (idk why thou) =)"

"Some of his work is fantastic! And some of his work is kind of boring., But check more of it out!"

"I think it would do well to take a look at the work of ZdzisÃ...?aw BeksiÃ...?ski, you can see the obvious influence in Chet's work and that may be one of the reasons why the figures are called "Static". It also fits very well with vintage portraiture, where the figure often looked like the dead propped up. But, on first glance I can see how they would be static. Great textures though, no?"

"I'm sorry but his work has no movement. It's so static. And there's not much difference from one to another in terms of composition. The characters look cool...I think this Chet Zar is more of a character designer trying to be fine artist...not working for me but he's popular so it works for many others out there. Just ain't my cup of tea."

"Nice use of color and lack thereof."

"I almost peed my pants when i saw that clown, but then i crapped myself instead! Awesome duuuuuuuuuuuude."

"This really creeps me out! :-)"

"I Do NOT want those creations in my house!"


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