FUTURA x Hennessy x Chuck Taylor Collaboration
Hennessy Cognac
The "Chuck's"
Photos courtesy of Hyperbeast
Futura 2000 started to paint illegally on New York Subways in the early seventies, working along with Keith Haring, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Richard Hamilton and Kenny Scharf. Futura began painting "legally" as the live on-stage backdrop painter for British punk rock band The Clash's 1981 European tour. He is also a successful graphic designer and gallery artist. Futura pioneered abstract street art which has since become more popular. Conversely, his aerosol strokes are regarded as different from those of his peers, with fine lines achieved only through the use of an airbrush
While he is primarily known as a graffiti artist, much of his work is as an illustrator and graphic designer of record sleeves, first becoming involved with The Clash; producing a sleeve for their "This is Radio Clash" 7 inch single and handwriting the sleeve notes and lyrics sheet for their album Combat Rock. He also toured extensively with The Clash during the Combat Rock tours, "performing" with them on stage by spray painting backdrops whilst the band performed.Years later, Mo-Wax Records founder James Lavelle resurrected his career by getting him to produce the artwork for several releases for Mo-Wax records; this also led to Futura producing the imagery which has largely defined Lavelle's UNKLE project. During the 1990s he was involved with clothing companies such as GFS, Subware and Project Dragon. More recently much of Futura's artwork has evolved into the production of highly collectible toys, Sneakers; and a diverse range of creative media, working with Recon, Nike, The North Face, Medicom Toy, Undercover, Supreme, Levi's and A Bathing Ape.
