ON
Canada
Ashley Floréal is a Haitian-Canadian illustrator and painter living in Toronto, Canada, who has contributed work to editorial, literary, entertainment and gallery spaces since graduating Sheridan College in 2013 with an Honours degree in Interpretive Illustration.
Influenced by horror, neo-noir, glamour and lowbrow aesthetics, her work often explores both intersection and contradiction: the intersection of warring traumas, of race, sexuality and identity, and contradictions in message, symbolism and subject matter: between the feminine and the macabre, the vibrant and the melancholy, the traditional and the grotesque. Her painting style seeks to balance figurative, pop and surrealist elements in a way that creates a sense of unreality that, depending on content and context, could present as dreamlike or nightmarish.
Alternatively, she also loves illustrating for film, television, musical acts, and generally weird stuff.