If Pippi Longstocking and Ingmar Bergman had a love child, it would be Mia Mäkilä. The Swedish artist scours our nightmares for inspiration, painting haunting childlike demons that would even make Tim Burton weep. Makila is particularly known for her Boschian (Hieronymus Bosch) style in her mixed media works, and she is inspired by movie directors such as Terry Gilliam, John Waters and Hitchcock, as well as 13th-17th century artists like Pieter Bruegel the elder, Hans Memling and Lucas Cranach.  She is also involved in the European Lowbrow Art Movement.

“I guess everyone’s calling me a “horror artist” because I deal with difficult emotions and themes such as fear, angst, madness, rage and sorrow in my art. But I also use a lot of humour. Making my demons having fun on the canvas. You could describe my art as horror pop surrealism or dark lowbrow. My work includes mixed media, paintings and digital collages.

I’m self taught, using my own techniques and constantly learning new stuff. Sometimes it works, sometimes it sucks, but that’s all part of my self education. The fact that I’m also an art historian has definitely had a great impact on my art. But I’m mostly inspired by movies and film directors such as David Lynch, Ingmar Bergman, Alfred Hitchcock, Roy Andersson, Terry Gilliam and Tim Burton and artists like Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Bruegel, Francisco Goya, Jean-Michel Basquiat and the masters of Disney Studio’s in the 1930’s-40’s. All my collegues in the Lowbrow Art Movement are also inspiration sources.”

Makila has a fantastic website with a huge catalogue of her work and a new blog The Wonderland of Mia Mäkilä, where she shares paintings, news, videos, curiosities and vintage things.