Celebrating fashion, sports, art, and commerce, adidas and LA's HVW8 Gallery announce the release of new artwork on shoes from two design world stars: Kevin Lyons and Jean André.
On Saturday, November 15, HVW8 will kick off an international series of events celebrating the collabs with live appearances, ancillary art, a display of the new shoes from the two artists, and a special music guest.
Keep reading for the artists' statements and a grip of preview images...
Kevin Lyons
“I wanted to create bright, colorful all-over prints. But making sure that they are still very wearable...” says Lyons, “With the Seeley, I wanted to experiment with a lot of the watercolor on paper backgrounds that I have been doing over the past couple of years. I played around with very saturated color mixing that created an analog, thermodynamic Predator-like pattern. I like the moody blue and rich tones that some of the saturations and bleeding make.”
With the Ease, Lyons saw an opportunity to use some of the color fill drips from his larger mural paintings where he often uses sponges and water-based paint to loosely fill his Monster characters. The drips then often make for interesting compositions of drops and splatters.
“I loved the idea of doing a white shoe that then had the watercolor on it...But it is not meant to look like literal paint splatters – more a fabric design that was made up of those drops and splatters.”
Jean André
Speaking on his Seeley design, Jean says, “I always wear full color shoes. I’m not into many colors and many shapes. I wanted a special product that looks like something I would wear. I figured out that if you were to stand in a pool of black ink with your white shoes, then it could be a cool look and feel.”
For his Adi-Ease, Jean looked at an all-over pattern of more sensual shapes and the formal similarities between leaves and women’s lips. Jean adds, “I thought that everybody would expect me to draw girls on the shoes, but I don’t really love figurative patterns. I did, however, want a thugged-out black and white pair that I’d be proud to rock, so I added the girl inside as a signature, last touch.”
THE EVENT:
The November 15 event at HVW8 Art + Design will be followed by an installation at Art Basel in Miami from December 3 - 7 and special pop-up galleries to follow in Europe. Both artists and HVW8 want each launch date to be a full-on event. Expect live-paintings, large scale murals, and plenty of great live music.
Lyons and André's creations will be available for purchase at PacSun by the beginning of December, before a wider release by year's end.
WHEN/WHERE:
Saturday, November 15th 2014 - 7PM - 10PM
Exhibition runs through December 28, 2014
