BIOGRAPHY
Ryan Staelgraeve (Born in 1994)
Graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Art from Northern Illinois University. As a neurodivergent individual, I’ve developed a strong curiosity and passion for exploring a wide range of interests, which has given me a versatile and creative perspective when approaching new ideas and opportunities. From an early age, I was passionate about doodling whatever came to mind. It was a way of expressing myself, from creating imaginative cartoon drawings in my notebooks to scenes from my favorite movies on my VHS. My creativity was always flowing, and my hands were expressing it in my art. In high school, I began to understand myself better, which allowed me to express what it means to be neurodivergent in my work. This is when a spark of experimenting with realism was ignited within me. From then on, my focus shifted to capturing the realities of my everyday life.
As an undergraduate, I found myself enjoying genres such as Renaissance and Baroque. The expression and movement within these genres tell stories that encourage viewers to think deeply and wonder what may happen next. While I started experimenting with oil painting, I explored the idea of mixing the style of the Renaissance and Baroque with contemporary technology. This project was to get everyone’s attention to observe and reflect on how modern life floods people with fast images designed for immediate consumption.
After graduation, I began building my portfolio. However, the emergence of COVID-19 started to take effect in my everyday life, and the lockdown limited my ability to create art. This was a time filled with anxiety and uncertainty, which hindered my creative flow. In an effort to reconnect with my work, I enrolled in online courses, which helped me strengthen my technical skills. My artistic approach became more structured as I began using measurement and comparative techniques to capture the realism of portraits and inanimate objects. More importantly, the discipline and demands of realism taught me to trust in my abilities as an artist. Ultimately, this experience renewed my confidence and motivated me to continue developing my portfolio. After living these experiences and experimenting with different art styles, I have found what I would like my art to be expressed as. Being neurodivergent has allowed me to look at things differently and create art from that.
CV
STATEMENT
My work confronts the lived reality of autism with clarity and precision. Using oil painting and graphite, I illustrate the internal processes that shape how I think, react, plan, and communicate. These processes are often ignored, dismissed, or misinterpreted, creating more challenges on top of the ones already brought on by my neurodivergency. Rather than masking these experiences to meet the expectations of others, I place them at the center of my practice, treating them as serious, valid, and worthy of acknowledgement. I focus on the constant effort required to function in environments not designed for neurodivergent minds, highlighting the challenges of navigating social rules, managing unpredictable stimuli, and maintaining composure under unseen pressure. By making these forces visible, I challenge assumptions about what is “normal,” “easy,” or expected to be endured. My work asserts that neurodivergent perspectives are not marginal but complete, structured, and legitimate, and it resists the pressure to mask, minimize, or simplify lived experience.