Jay Ryan (born June 15, 1972, in

St. Louis St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...

Missouri Missouri is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee ...

) is a poster maker and rock musician. He is noted for his

squirrel Squirrels are members of the family Sciuridae, a family that includes small or medium-size rodents. The squirrel family includes tree squirrels, ground squirrels (including chipmunks and prairie dogs, among others), and flying squirrels. Squ ...

posters as well as being a

bassist A bassist (also known as a bass player or bass guitarist) is a musician who plays a Bass (instrument), bass instrument such as a double bass (upright bass, contrabass, wood bass), bass guitar (electric bass, acoustic bass), synthbass, keyboar ...

in the band

Dianogah Dianogah (pronounced Dye-ah-NO-gah) is an American indie rock band formed in 1995, noted for their use of two bass guitars. Members include Kip McCabe, Jay Ryan (artist), Jay Ryan, and Jason Harvey (musician), Jason Harvey. History Dianogah's ...

. Working in

Skokie, Illinois Skokie (; formerly Niles Center) is a village in Cook County, Illinois, United States, neighboring the City of Chicago's northern border. Its population, according to the 2020 census, was 67,824. Skokie lies approximately north of Chicago's do ...

, Ryan produces limited run, hand-printed posters for rock bands and concerts, and for events such as art shows. Most of his work is screen printed at his print shop, The Bird Machine. He has produced posters for the bands

Shellac Shellac () is a resin secreted by the female lac bug on trees in the forests of India and Thailand. It is processed and sold as dry flakes and dissolved in alcohol to make liquid shellac, which is used as a brush-on colorant, food glaze and ...

and the

Flaming Lips Flaming may refer to: * Anything set aflame or on fire * Flaming (Internet), the act of posting deliberately hostile messages on the Internet * Flame maple, the striped figures in maple woodwork prized for their beauty * Fläming, a region in G ...

, as well as thousands of others; he is also responsible for the album art and track illustrations of

Andrew Bird Andrew Wegman Bird (born July 11, 1973) is an American indie rock multi-instrumentalist, singer, and songwriter. Since 1996, he has released 16 studio albums, as well as several live albums and EPs, spanning various genres including swing musi ...

The Mysterious Production of Eggs ''Andrew Bird & the Mysterious Production of Eggs'' is the third album of Andrew Bird's career post-Andrew Bird's Bowl of Fire, Bowl of Fire, released in 2005, following his ''Weather Systems (Andrew Bird album), Weather Systems'' in 2003. The alb ...

and

Weather Systems Weather is the state of the atmosphere, describing for example the degree to which it is hot or cold, wet or dry, calm or stormy, clear or cloudy. On Earth, most weather phenomena occur in the lowest layer of the planet's atmosphere, the tr ...

In 2005 he published a book called ''100 Posters, 134 Squirrels: A Decade of Hot Dogs, Large Mammals, and Independent Rock: The Handcrafted Art of Jay Ryan''. He also provided the cover art for

Michael Chabon Michael Chabon ( ; born May 24, 1963) is an American novelist, screenwriter, columnist, and short story writer. Born in Washington, DC, he spent a year studying at Carnegie Mellon University before transferring to the University of Pittsburgh, gr ...

's 2004 novel ''

The Final Solution The Final Solution (german: die Endlösung, ) or the Final Solution to the Jewish Question (german: Endlösung der Judenfrage, ) was a Nazi Germany, Nazi plan for the genocide of individuals they defined as Jews during World War II. The "Final ...

'' and publicity art for Chicago's

57th Street Art Fair The 57th Street Art Fair is Chicago's oldest juried art fair. Founded in 1948, it is held the first weekend in June annually on 57th Street between Kimbark and Kenwood Avenues, in the Chicago neighborhood of Hyde Park, directly north of the Unive ...

. Ryan had previously been a bassist for

Braid A braid (also referred to as a plait) is a complex structure or pattern formed by interlacing two or more strands of flexible material such as textile yarns, wire, or hair. The simplest and most common version is a flat, solid, three-strande ...

, but left shortly after its formation. He then joined

Hubcap A hubcap or hub cap is a decorative disk on an automobile wheel that covers at minimum the central portion of the wheel, called the hub. An automobile hubcap is used to cover the wheel hub and the wheel fasteners to reduce the accumulation o ...

before forming

in 1995. Jay Ryan attended New Trier High School in Winnetka, IL.

Sources

* Anders Smith Lindall, "Off the Wall: Jay Ryan's Whimsical Illustrations Put a Face on the Chicago Rock Scene", ''

Chicago Sun-Times The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the ''Chicago T ...

'', Tuesday, December 20, 2005, p. 49 * Jay Ryan, ''100 Posters, 134 Squirrels: A Decade of Hot Dogs, Large Mammals, and Independent Rock: The Handcrafted Art of Jay Ryan'', Akashic Books, Chicago, Illinois 2005

External links

Galleries at The Bird MachineReview of 100 Posters, 134 Squirrels at PopMatters.comGalleries and Sale at the ICO O'Hare Hoteldocumentary film featuring Jay Ryan
American rock bass guitarists American poster artists Album-cover and concert-poster artists Living people 1972 births Guitarists from Chicago American male bass guitarists 21st-century American bass guitarists 21st-century American male musicians {{US-bass-guitarist-stub