Art That Makes You Think Hoodies

Be radically different. Choose not to advertise corporations and their often questionable ethics and values. Choose not ubiquity. Choose not to graze on the fields of conspicuous consumption. You are not a salesperson. You are not a sheep. You are your own.

Do you like to be bad? What about good? Either way you are what you are, so use this design to prove that you're smart, I guess. Uhhhh.... So this design is guaranteed to satisfy your bakery needs. Who doesn't love chemistry? Class is out for the season!

Part of my supermarket coaster series spoofing Penguin classic books and plays. Oscar Wilde was sending up the staid etiquette of nineteenth century Britain; I am satirising that a stripped down Aldi store is far from elegant refinement - no butler here - and that's how I like it!

Create ART that makes you Smile

From my Shakespeare coaster collection. When William Shakespeare is not writing sonnets to his male lover, or writing comedies that aren't funny, he imagines stories where nothing happens, except a bunch of words; often in the wrong order.

A retro motivational design for manifesting one's beliefs. Use of geometric shapes in a marquee sign aesthetic.

Donald Trump made his reputation funding skyscraper construction, often anointed with his name. In 2020, following a presidency bent on dismantling world order, his tower went flacid & his fake tan splashed.

From my Shakespearean spoof coaster collection: A tragic romance is a rare genre of play, but Will Shakespeare - the bard of his day - nailed this pot boiler. This design contains a 500 year old plot spoiler.

Part of my supermarket coaster collection. Samuel Beckett’s interminable play has strong parallels with waiting in a supermarket queue except of course for Waitrose, because service standards are so high!

Be radically different, don't advertise corporations on your body. That's what they want you to do. Look yourself in the mirror, and say, "I am not a billboard. This is my own private space. I refuse to be a sheep."

Part of a self-isolation coaster collection. If our lockdown was a magical realist novel, would we dream of 1000s of Colombian lovers, or be thankful to the one who answered yes to... “Voulez-vous lockdown avec moi?”

In the polarised frenzy of the referendum campaign and its divisive aftermath, I could hear the ranting voice of Rent, Ewan McGregor's character in Danny Boyle's Trainspotting. I heard much sense in this rant, so I tried to make sense of the referendum vote in a similar way.

A Pangolin Poets coaster parody of Metamorphoses, 250 witty stories of transformation assembled by Ovid from classical antiquity: Zeus as a swan, Perseus swinging a head of snakes... Post Covid - our transformation may be deeper.

A unique book shelf composition of 45+ of my vintage Pangolin Books spoof titles themed on the self-isolation of humankind during the pandemic. Enabling us to laugh rather than cry over this challenging period. Spoof covers include 'A Zoom with a View'. by I.M. Furloughed; The Handwashing Tale, by Margaret AtWoodHouse; and many more!

When the US elected a reality TV mogul as their president, it is only fitting that he should end after 4 long seasons with, "You're Fired!". It would be funny if it weren't desperately serious. [insert joke here]

Imagine you know someone so well, you know all of their faults - their choice cuts if you like - and yet you love them still. Indeed, you love them all the more for it. He's a chauvinist pig, she's a complete cow; come dine togther every friday night at the Butcher's Arms.

Ever since reading Naomi Klein's No Logo book exposing the dark arts of marketing, I have been fascinated about the 'Emperor's no clothes' myth of marketing, and it's importance in modern capitalist society. Only those who pay think they see it, ironically, the coolest don't need it.

Unfortunately, vacuousity is not a word, but the phrase still captures the inanity and banality of a mirror world online, full of cat videos, and cats being distracted by their owners watching cat videos on their phones.

For corporations and governments there is nothing more incendiary than someone pausing to collect their thoughts. The revolution will not be distracted. Put up a warning sign to say that you aren’t to be trifled with. "Know thyself", as Socrates said, in this digital surveillance world is more vital now than ever.

This is the coming together of an unashamedly middle class British brand FatFace, which began on the alpine ski slopes, created by a couple of posh blokes, then became white-collar uniform for the overworked professional classes. Ergo: RatRace.

Let's go meta! Irony is my medium; therefore I felt my ironic T-shirt range must include a dictionary definition-style design. I couldn't help adding a dramatic slant to the irony definition, where the wearer doesn't know they are being ironic...

During the pandemic, we learnt to stay at home. Some of us worked. Some of us didn't get out of our pyjamas. With all those filters and backgrounds, we were forever Zoom ready. You've got active wear; this is inactive, commute-resistant wear.

In the 1960s, Andy Warhol painted what he saw - he loved money, admired A-list stars, ate Campbells soup and drank Coca Cola. He was not parodying US capitalism. ;-) That is my job!

My inspiration is the great Belgian surrealist, Rene Magritte. "Ceci n'est pas un pipe." This may look like a sheep, but it is not. The person wearing this design does not flock, they go their own way, they do not follow. So it cannot be a sheep.

Do you ever feel like you have been numbed by modern life? - The constant grind, the routine, the predatory marketing and the constant search for distraction. Have you arrived to the point where you no longer care? You are never going to be cool, but you can be you.

If you feel inadequate, take some relief from knowing that there are millions of highly intelligent/highly paid people whose job in marketing is to make you feel that way...Then to sell you stuff while you are vulnerable. You're better than that.

'Surveillance capitalism' describes the monetisation of our imagination through the sale of our online activity data. This piece, inspired by Warhol's soup cans and The Matrix, warns that we are the soup. The question is, who is eating us?

When Andy Warhol first started painting Campbell soup cans in his studio, he was surrounded by them. He painted what he saw - his lunch. He loved money and was drawn to A-list movie stars; so he painted soup cans, dollar bills and Monroe. What he didn't do, was to satirise the terrible impact of all-pervasive capitalism. That’s my job :-)

So titled because the Brexit referendum left Britain ajar, and at war with itself. The debate, such as it was, extracted our bitterness; the black salty stuff was 'rich in [intergenerational] conflict; in the end, was only '52% guaranteed'. Love it or hate it; inspired by Warhol; created by Tories...

There are words and phrases that we see and hear all of the time; strangely meaningless. Like forms with mysteriously blank pages; like the brand of corporations that cover our clothes and accessories. Hocking branded products seems to be what we are born to do. Is that right?

This vintage-style design is a parody on the Tokyo Laundry brand, which was a copy of Superdry. It also embraces the LGBTQ community's sense of fun, and of course the 1985 classic, My Beautiful Laundrette by Stephen Frears starring Daniel Day-Lewis.

In 2016, when the referendum had us all in its cross-hairs and we were on the edge of falling into Nigel Farage's wet dream, Britain was a polarised place. Back then, we didn't know for sure if we'd be fu*ked. Now we have no illusions, but we're still united. At least some of us.

This is the idler; walking the other way. It's that advert years ago…where a bloke in a suit is walking across the Millennium Bridge to St. Pauls/City of London. He stops to look right and left; everyone looks like him. He thinks, "No - I'm different!" and turns to walk the other way. Only, in the end, the advert is selling you mobile phones, phones which we all buy. Now look at that bridge in 2022...