Ryan O'Neil provides an antidote to a COVID winter with island inspired poetry and photography in his debut publication, Ritual and Ruin.

Ritual and Ruin explores migrant melancholy, multiculturalism and millennial romance through a poetic lens.

Nov 30, 2020

TORONTO, Ontario

After a number of years floating around Toronto's underground poetry scene and honing his visual aesthetic while rejecting offers to buy his work, Jamaican born artist Ryan O'Neil has released his first book, Ritual and Ruin on November 20, 2020. Through this book of poetry and digitally edited photography, Ryan offers an antidote to a chilly Canadian COVID winter with his island inspired art.

With vivid poetry and arresting digitally-distorted imagery, Ritual and Ruin tells the story of Ryan O'Neil’s migrant melancholy, and the formation of the colourful multicultural identity owned by a Jamaican artist based in Toronto. Containing poems that explore millennial romance and the ‘outsider’ feelings that flavour the many migrant experiences common to Toronto, Ritual and Ruin serves both as the retrospective of a young artist's early work and as a view into the complex emotions that arise in adopting a new home.

Since moving back to Canada to attend the University of Waterloo where he gained a Bachelor’s degree in Statistics, Ryan has gradually turned away from his left-brain proficiencies and embraced his creative side, compiling over 70 pieces of art in his brilliant debut publication. Told over 6 acts, Ritual and Ruin traces Ryan’s life from his late teens in Jamaica through his early Canadian adulthood in a smooth yet dissonant narrative. With its dreamy lyrical sequences and sharp imagery, Ritual and Ruin offers the perfect mix of poetic and visual stimulation to grant the reader an escape from the pandemic malaise with a touch of the deeply coveted Jamaican vibe, without the need for airport security or a lengthy post-landing quarantine.

Ritual and Ruin is available in a poetry-only paperback, as well as a hardcover that includes all the digital photography attached to the project.

For more details on Ritual and Ruin or Ryan O’Neil, visit https://www.ryanimagines.com.

About Ryan O'Neil

A budding artistic maverick, Ryan O'Neil is a Jamaican born artist based in Toronto, Canada. Through his poetry, painting and other works, Ryan channels his Caribbean influences to create dream like pieces that explore the dissonance and beauty of multiculturalism.