Call Him ‘Alien’: Meet the Masked N.Y.C. Artist Painting Portraits for Celebrities (Exclusive)

Mar. 15, 2025

Michael Alan ‘Alien’ in his home studio in Greenwich Village, New York City.Photo:Vic Verbalaitis

Vic Verbalaitis

Michael Alan was born into a world of darkness – but thanks to his art, has now become a source of light.

Hilarie Burton poses with a portrait she commissioned from artist Michael Alan ‘Alien’.Courtesy of Michael Alan

Courtesy of Michael Alan

His artwork has been featured in countless exhibitions, galleries, and evenJeffrey Dean MorganandHilarie Burton’s bedroom.

Burton is a “big supporter and friend,” Alan tells PEOPLE, and they have “talked for years and years.”

“They had commissioned me to do their wedding photo, which came out great,” Alan says. “With all of these different little snippets of their life — they trusted me with all this great information.”

Alan recounts another time where he ran into Morgan at Washington Square Park in Manhattan — where Morgan was with other members ofThe Walking Deadcast — and the two talked about art before Morgan purchased another piece from Alan.

“[Morgan] has been really supportive. He told me the painting was right in his bedroom, like his favorite piece,” Alan says. “He said it really means a lot to him.”

Michael Alan ‘Alien’ (left) and Jeffrey Dean Morgan in New York City.Courtesy of Michael Alan

And Morgan isn’t the onlyThe Walking Deadstar to celebrate Alan’s art —Norman Reedushas also commissioned Alan’s work.

Alan says that he and Reedus met sometime around 2018 while donating artwork to the Coalition for the Homeless, which is where their friendship sparked.

Michael Alan ‘Alien’ (left) and Norman Reedus.Courtesy of Michael Alan

Since then, Reedus has commissioned him for his art on several occasions, including designing thebookplate for Reedus’s debut novel,The Ravaged, as well as a portrait of Reedus and his partner Diane Kruger.

“Norman’s made a lot of my art reallyviral with his posts. He’s really put things up there on the internet in a really great way,” Alan says. “We just talk all the time — he’s just a really cool person.”

Alan grew up in N.Y.C. during the 80s and 90s — in an era where street art reigned supreme and artists like Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat began making their mark on the art world.

As a kid, he says he internalized the bustling world he saw around him, finding comfort in drawing things that were weathered and misplaced.

Michael Alan ‘Alien’ holding one of his line drawing pieces.Vic Verbalaitis

Drawing from his lived experience of moving between the boroughs with his family throughout his childhood, Alan’s art focuses on change and movement through the lens of N.Y.C., illustrating the hardships and allures that accompany it.

“Real passion comes from people who struggle, and they find a way to take their struggle and their pain and make great art,” Alan notes to PEOPLE.

Over four decades, Alan’s artwork has transitioned through various stylistic periods, from haphazard yet precise color-saturated paintings to distinctly detailed line drawings, which often feature tiny scenes that combine to form a larger image — or “pictures within pictures,” as Alan calls it.

But it’s his more recent work with a project called “The Living Installation” that Alan is most proud of.

Alan’s “Living Installation” parades as an amalgamation of artistic expression: body art, costume design, human sculpture and “guerilla street performance” all rolled into one immersive experience.

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Alan and his creative and life partner Jadda Cat, 35, take to the streets of N.Y.C. and present their bodies as their canvases, sporting elaborate handcrafted outfits designed with cardboard, paint and littered with QR codes — which link to videos detailing the process behind their art — and wearing robot-like box helmets attached with GoPros to capture the perspective behind their blocky partitions.

“I was always wearing masks and doing weird mask stuff because I didn’t really want people to see my face. I just felt like it wasn’t important,” Alan says. “I just wanted to be anonymous but still do cool stuff.”

Michael Alan ‘Alien’ (left) and his partner Jadda Cat wear two of their handcrafted ‘The Living Installation’ costumes.Vic Verbalaitis

It meshes perfectly with his self-identified pseudonym “Alien,” which he attributes to feeling like an outsider in his own city, as well as his love for embodying characters and not taking himself too seriously.

“I am a very serious artist, but I really like to play around,” Alan shares.

It also helps that he loves speaking in silly voices, like the squeaky, raspy tone he puts on as he asks some fellow artists at a Draw-A-Thon party he threw for his 47th birthday, “Who else ate a bunch of mustard today?”

“It’s not weird to be weird — it’s creative to be creative,” Alien says. “Life is weird.”

source: people.com