theboobosh®blog
A Children's Clothing CompanyArchive for Illustration
Gap Kids x Threadless
On May 7th, Gap and Threadless launched a whole new line of graphic tees and onsies for toddlers and babies made by Lim Heng Swee | Lim is a self-taught illustrator and visual artist who excels in bringing to life cute animals and ironic statements through drawing | His philosophy is ‘Doodling A Smile’ | Lim’s aim is to make people smile more | Now available at gap.com/threadless.
Aurel Schmidt | Count The Crows
boobosh has always been a big fan of Aurel’s work | See our Introducing post from April 2010 | Well now you can own this fantastic print that benefits both RxArt and the Middle Eastern Children’s Alliance | Limited edition of 50 off | Available at Exhibition A.
The Onion’s Great Escape | Sara Fanelli
The story of one vegetable’s survival in an interactive children’s book | As a cross between illustration, philosophy and paper engineering, Sara Fanelli’s most recent children’s book ‘The Onion’s Great Escape’ challenges the limitations of reading as an interactive experience | Following the quest of an onion as it attempts to escape its apparent fate of death by frying, the book’s perforated core is removed page-by-page until, at the end, the onion is literally freed from the book | The innovative fusion of tactile activity and illustration is taken a step further by a call-and-response method of asking children difficult questions with room for a written answer | Throughout the die-cut, 68-page work, questions range from the categorical ‘What is your name?’ to the metaphysical ‘What is the longest minute you can remember?’ | Rather than dumbing down the experience, each page challenges young minds to come up with a creative response | Fanelli’s illustrations show an impressive range, and she is able to freeze moments of delight and despair as the onion flies through obstacles on its journey to save himself | Each page of ‘The Onion’s Great Escape’ offers a new look and experience, and the diversity of styles is enhanced by the perforated core, which can be mixed and matched with different pages in the book | As the onion gradually breaks free from the pages, it emerges to stand alone as a 3D entity—the remainder of the book’s content staying intact | Sara Fanelli was born in Florence | She came to London to study art, and has been working there as a designer and illustrator since graduating from the Royal College of Art in 1995 | She divides her time between self-generated projects and commercial illustration commissions from a wide range of international clients, including the New Yorker, Penguin Books, Faber & Faber, Tate Modern, The Victoria & Albert Museum, Ron Arad, Issey Miyake, the New York Times and the Royal Mail | She has written and illustrated a number of children’s books, and her work has been exhibited in venues around the world | She has twice been the overall winner of the Victoria & Albert Museum’s illustration award and been awarded two D&AD pencils | ’The Onion’s Great Escape’ is available for pre-order from Amazon.co.uk.
User Design | Design Books
Boutique graphic design outfit User Design recently released a series of self-published works united by British wit and a simple, hand-drawn aesthetic | The titles include ‘The Journey of the Larks’, ‘Punctuation…?’ and “Life”, and they all show an emerging playful side of the predominantly commercial publisher | Illustrated, designed and created by Thomas Bohm, the trio matches supremely minimal design with an endearing sense of play | User Design’s collection of books can be purchased through Amazon and Central Books starting at £8 or $12.80 | Simple, but then that’s the way boobosh likes things…
¡Oh! ¡Un Zig-Zag! | Antonio Ladrillo
Illustrator Antonio Ladrillo from Barcelona has created a new limited-edition minimalistic children’s book that focuses on shapes, colours and smiling faces | The artist’s twelve double page illustration book, written in Spanish, turns geometric figures into friendly characters that convey their state of being | Limited to 500 copies | Price: 5 euros | 18 x 18 cm, 28 pages | Get your kids practicing their Spanish, geometry and self-expression with ¡Oh! ¡Un Zig-Zag! by Antonio Ladrillo.
Evan Hecox | Stolen Space | London
Evan Hecox is a Colorado-based artist and designer whose work portrays the essence of urban environments | His work depicts city scenes or isolated elements that are almost cinematic in their stark contrast and abstraction | Hecox is fascinated with the complexity of the urban landscape and people from the mundane surroundings that one would normally overlook | Like snapshots or filmstrips, his art captures the everyday existence of the average person as they traverse the detritus of the modern metropolis | His stylistic approach is based on the process of amplification as it affects form and color, breaking down the image, removing elements and emphasizing others | Hecox has exhibited worldwide, including exhibitions in Los Angeles, London and Tokyo | boobosh is a big fan and his recent exhibition at London’s Stolen Space Gallery saw him create works based on buildings and scenes around London and try to ‘offer a glimpse of what London felt like to an outsider’.
Andy Smith | Sunny Side Up | Soma | Bristol
Illustrator Andy Smith’s solo show, Sunny Side Up, is currently running at Bristol’s Soma gallery until August 20th 2011 | The show features a host of screenprints, invariably featuring hand-lettered messages, plus some painted and screenprinted wooden panel artworks too | Hastings based illustrator Andy Smith studied at Brighton University and the Royal College of Art | When not busy working for clients such as Orange, Nike, McDonalds, The Guardian and Faber and Faber he can be found in his studio by the sea in Hastings printing books and posters which he has exhibited in the UK, France, USA and Australia | Specialising in silkscreen printing Andy’s work combines illustration and typography to create images with humour, energy and optimism, executed with a handmade tactile feel | Illustrating for 12 years, his work has won D&AD, Creative Circle and AOI awards and been featured in numerous books and publications | His summer show at Soma Gallery in Bristol will include a set of 12 new large artworks, hand screenprinted by Andy and featuring his distinct hand lettering and visuals | They deal with bold statements, strange visitors, warnings from gurus, the thoughts of Captain Scott and other random themes | Accompanying these prints will be an eclectic collection of new 3D arrows and moose heads, totes, stickers and one sad lonely, goldfish | Many of the pieces are available to purchase in limited runs from the Soma shop | asmithillustration.com | somagallery.co.uk
super superficial | Kids Tees
super superficial, the independent clothing label based in London, has recently presented their first round of Kids t-shirts for 2011 | Featuring designs from Hannah Melin, Mathew Green, Jean Granon, Mike Perry, Shen Plum and Joelle Merizen with her Kiwi T, these latest styles are available to purchase in both central London stores and online now | “We collaborate with the world’s best graphic artists and illustrators to create exclusive, original, high-quality garments” explains the label | All their Ts are made from heavyweight, pre-shrunk cotton and are all silk-screen printed in London | super superficial Ts are for kids from around 6 years and up | All styles come in small and medium and are suitable for boys and girls who enjoy wearing something a little different in the playground | Whether they are worn for an afternoon of skateboarding, for a friend’s party or just to hang out, these Ts will always get kids noticed and always make them the envy of all their friends | Shop super superficial @ 17 Fouberts Place, Carnaby, W1F 7QD & 22 Earlham Street Covent Garden WC2H 9LN. Opening hours are 11.00 to 19.00 Mon – Sat and 12.00 to 17.00 on a Sunday | A new website was recently launched to allow customers the chance you to shop super superficial wherever you are in the World at www.supersuperficial.com | Launched in 2007 with the opening of their first shop in the Carnaby Street area, it took the super team just another year to set up store number two in Covent Garden | Both premises have recently undergone a revamp to strengthen the brand’s identity and to showcase the merchandise better | boobosh for one is a big fan (a few of our fave designs are shown below) and if you get a chance, please make sure you read the description that accompanies each tee design on their website!
Mike O’Shea | Highbrow Skateboards
Bristol-based illustrator and skater Mike O’Shea has just released his first limited-edition deck as part of his skate/design project, The Highbrow Company | As a collaborator with Howies and The Harmony Skateboard Company, O’Shea’s esoteric illustrations have been offending the old and the prudish for quite a few years now | thehighbrowcompany.com
Shepard Fairy | The Surfrider Foundation
Celebrating 25 years of coastal conservation, The Surfrider Foundation is working with 25 different artists to illustrate famous breaks | One of those commissioned is by boobosh fave Shepard Fairy (shown above), along with illustrations by other boobosh faves like Raymond Pettibon and Barry McGee | Fairy worked with photographer Tom Servais on an original piece depicting Maui’s famous Jaws wave | The illustration is to be sold at the Surfrider’s Art for the Ocean Anniversary Gala, but is also available to the public through the Obey Awareness Program in t-shirt form | Purchase serves as one way of donating to The Surfrider Foundation via Coolhunting | boobosh loves the illustration but not too sure it works on a tee in our humble opinion | obeyclothing.com/#/awareness | www.surfrider.org
