I recently reviewed Antiphrase, an independent French arts t-shirt label at my other blog Buy-Tees.net. As it happens they liked my art and invited me to submit my own t-shirt designs.

I spent (most of) the weekend coming up with "Viral Society", and I’m pleased with the results. Here’s a preview of the t-shirt design and an explanation for the work…

"Viral Society references a correlation between the original Spanish Influenza epidemic of 1918. More people died of influenza in a single year than in four-years of the Black Death Bubonic Plague from 1347 to 1351. The fact that the world is quickly becoming overpopulated, people are more likely to travel far further than ever before, as cities grow larger, and land is sold at higher and higher premiums, we cannot escape the most successful virus the planet has ever known. That being the human race. Human beings behave like no other organism on earth, that is excepting biological viruses.

We consume everything, we over breed, we reduce our natural resources to nothing, and finally will the death of ourselves. Diseases in general have begun to "compete" with the human race over the last few decades, be it Swine Flu, Mad Cow Disease, Ebola, AIDS, we as a race are facing the final defense of our planet to control our explosive population count. Our mere existence has accelerated global warming, the pollution of the world’s water and air supply, and the destruction of a vast majority of bio-diverse species and regions of the world.

As we combat the side effects of our increasing demand for every natural resource, the chemicals we produce, the fuels we burn, the materials we manufacture create bi-products that contribute to the toxic soup that continues to seep into the groundwater, root systems, and glacial regions of the planet. We are a disease, we are a virus, we communicate quickly across a hive mind, we extract and process raw materials faster than a swarm of locusts, yet we are doomed."

It should be available for sale as a t-shirt in the near future at www.antiphrase.fr, do take some time to check out the other artists there too, which include quite a few respected graffiti and street artists, plus some illustrators. I particularly like Goin’s stencil art.

Tags: antiphrase, art, baines, French graffiti, swine flu, t-shirt design, t-shirts, virus

Related posts

• Turn, Turn, Turn (0)
• Empty Rooms – Empty Minds (0)
• A Sunday With Bainsey (1)
• UK Government Turns Art Critic (7)
• Trust In The Brand, The Whole Brand And Nothing But… (1)

• linked fromhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/paulbaines/~3/rqtm8rE-UTQ/

• linked fromhttp://bristolgraffiti.wordpress.com/2009/08/17/jody-show-at-weapon-of-choice/

• linked fromhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/wooster/~3/p68nH9e6F-Q/dave_kinsey_an_introduction.html

• linked fromhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/wooster/~3/WNfQHdJHFxI/masthead_by_lindsay_maas_1.html

More here.

• linked fromhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/wooster/~3/rcD55udFxp4/fresh_stuff_from_blu_at_the_fame_festiva.html

(click to enlarge)

• linked fromhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/wooster/~3/gMf4J0b1kbc/priests_bad_habits_die_young.html

• linked fromhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/wooster/~3/hQtDth-wFiY/kanos_cellograff_in_paris.html

More from Vinchen here.

• linked fromhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/wooster/~3/4SSfvv1cQNI/fresh_stuff_from_vinchen_4.html

More from Other here.

• linked fromhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/wooster/~3/QQOuipwcgag/fresh_stuff_from_other_in_brooklyn.html

• linked fromhttp://bristolgraffiti.wordpress.com/2009/08/17/wanna-paint-in-weston/

Interestingly enough I looked up the meaning of "Soto" today and came up with Sōtō Zen, which in essence is the least popular of the three sects of Zen Buddhism, being nicknamed "Farmer Zen" by the Japanese. Fate has a funny way of wrapping coincidences together in such a tidy package it makes me wonder if there really is  some omniscient being out there, something like an old school hack, banging away at a typewriter and working out the script. The name is fitting, for Jeff Soto does engage his audience in a moment of perplexing meditation, a visual shock of the senses invariably leaving the viewer hanging in a strange and eerie space that takes some adjusting on one’s first encounter. Fuelled by a sumptuously organic iconography of a Daliesque persuasion, the perversions of the anima are left cerebrally hanging and entangled by the inner workings of a 21st Century mind.

You search for something familiar, the occasional smiling face, the pre-conscious of  simple shapes, the colours of a childhood remembered at the peak of an LSD trip, you find your psychological footing, your rhythm, your centre, and you’re away. Riding on the Soto rollercoaster of insane perspective, explosive pallete, and a strangely logical dynamic you soon realise the evolution Soto has passed through from his earliest installations to his later paintings and limited edition prints. He’s a favourite both sides of the Atlantic with regular showings at D*Face’s Stolen Space Gallery in London and  various galleries in NY and California including the Jonathan Levine Gallery and the Riverside Art Museum. Soto’s internal world seems unaffected, or at least on the surface, by his growing fame. However his works have become more ambitious, his talent for mixing hyper-realist imagery with painterly and graffitiesque backgrounds continues to grow,. Whilst his persistence of being,  his  far-sighted focus and continual expansion on a theme of psychological and metaphorical landscape, his embrace of  subverted iconography, and the plainly weird and bizarre remains unchanged.

The underlying message in much of Soto’s work connects on a primal almost primordial level, at least in regards to his visual language of emotion and instinct, fears, nostalgia, musings upon our mortality, love and lust,,and a hope for what is to come. One of the most memorable aspects of Soto’s later work is his distinct colour palette, vibrant, almost dream-like to a degree. An unnerving luminescence and vibrancy surrounds many of his central protagonists of a subconscious script  that only Soto  has the ability to read. What is most familiar are his inspirations, such as the toys of his childhood, the creative world of  skateboarding and graffiti, as well as hip-hop and popular culture. Whilst at first impression Soto’s pieces seem accessible, there is an entrancing quality to his work that for me personally rivals that of the continuous battle for precedence between consciousness and subconsciousness.

In the summer of 2006 Soto opened his online store at PotatoStamp.com where with the help of a friend and his brother sells a a selection of limited edition prints. Such as Inland Empire which regretfully for I and many others has already sold out.
 

 However if you have some spare cash Soto is still selling 50 limited edition giclee prints of one of his most famous pieces Nature’s Wrath. The original was shown at Stolen Space May 14th 2009 and for those who love Soto’s work this is probably a great investment.

You might be interested in Soto’s books too which are again available at Potato Stamp. I will definitely be keeping my on Soto’s work, it will be fascinating to see which direction he takes for the future.

Tags: art, graffiti, Jeff Soto, limited edition prints, paintings, Soto, Stolen Space

Related posts

• Warholes by Paul Baines (4)
• UK Government Turns Art Critic (7)
• Trust In The Brand, The Whole Brand And Nothing But… (1)
• Old School’s Out, Forever (0)
• Obey in the U.K (3)

• linked fromhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/paulbaines/~3/S_p47sOmzSA/

Gallery: The Cans Festival – Part 2 – Graffiti styles (29)
Wiispray turns Wii Remote into virtual graffiti spray can (0)
Who are Subism? (0)
Wahaca looking for an artist to paint for their new restaurant in [...]

• linked fromhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/UkStreetArt/~3/RJ5ZFNUa_cg/

Wiispray turns Wii Remote into virtual graffiti spray can (0)
Wahaca looking for an artist to paint for their new restaurant in Canary Wharf (1)
Vizo tribute (0)
Video: SheOne interview (0)
Video: Londonz White Trash (0)

• linked fromhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/UkStreetArt/~3/rnMiK6kyANs/