UKSA: Hey Mega, we’ve seen your involvement in some pretty super scale projects – what are some of the biggest pieces you’ve worked on?

MM: I suppose what your meaning by biggest. With regard to mural / live painting type work I would say that my mural whilst at McFaul Studio for Tiger Beer up in Glasgow was the largest single wall I’ve done… but more recently for ilovedust I was heavily involved in painting the entire inside of a new burger restaurant called Meat Liquor up in London.

But jobs such as Toshiba whilst at McFaul Studio and a Nike job connected with March Madness for ilovedust were incredibly involved and long term projects… together both jobs covered animation, web content, illustration, design and art direction.

Perhaps one of the most intense single Illustrations I’ve done is a project for a small Knitwear firm based in Brighton, Lark Rising. In total I believe it may have taken me nearly 1 month to draw this single illustration. It went through many changes and it really was a labour of love. View the whole thing here.

UKSA: Any particular street artists that influence what you do?

MM: I really love the work of Broken Fingaz. I like how they chop up walls into sections to reveal details or other scenarios within the piece. It’s also super bold work with bright colours and awesome comic influenced typography so those guys are definitely one influence.

I do love the large scale animals that Roa does, I’ve seen a few in london that caught my eye…. also a on a recent trip to NYC the stuff that DFace had done out there was really nice.

I’ve always liked Dave Kinsey, that goes way back I love his characters.

I really like what Blu has done, with working with the way murals are filmed… doing something new with it. That is something that really interests me. So far I haven’t done too much in the way of pushing how a live piece if filmed… the videos I’ve been involved in opt for more of a nicely shot and cleanly edited approach but I think it’d be interesting to one try something different with that at some point.

Mike giant is definitely another influence when it comes to live stuff… I admire that he can just bust out such tight piece of work… I love the black and white work or limited palettes… and he loves a skull and snake combo as do I at times.

With this recent collaboration mural I did with good friend Shan Jiang  we did try some new things in how we paint out a previous mural and messing about a bit with the stop motion… but not to the degree Blu has done.

Volvoartsession.com

UKSA: What is it about painting on walls that you love?

MM: I always say that murals are one of the most fun type of projects I get involved with. It allows me to get out of the studio, more recently travel the world, meet new people, and really get my hands dirty and create something original… it’s also a huge adrenalin rush doing something live and large often in front of people or even a crowd… it adds that pressure and gives you a buzz.

I also really enjoy the reception you get from people and how these murals make them happy. I remember in Glasgow when we did the Tiger Beer mural there was an office on the other side of the river from where we were working and towards the end of the week when we were finishing a lady from the office came over and said how much fun it was for them to watch us each day and that they had asked their followers on Facebook to try and guess what we were painting thorough out the week… it was really nice to know we’d given those guys something fun to watch that week. And there are many stories like that associated with murals I’ve worked on.

Often doing stuff from the studio comes in and goes out the door without even meeting your client and although that can be super fiun and rewarding too… I just think with murals every single one gives you that amazing buzz and that’s a really positive thing I get out of doing them.

I like how you can get a bit loose with things too… throw paint at a wall and see what happens… more recently I’ve started experimenting with spray paint for the first time… nothing technical but some simple spray paint effects have given a nice new angle to a few things I’ve worked on and I want to continue experimenting with that.

UKSA: Are street/live art & murals a large part of the commissions that come in for you/ILD?

MM: I think they are increasing, I wouldn’t say a large part… but who knows in the future perhaps they will become so. In my work I really like a balance, I’m not hoping that mural, installation work would take over as I’d miss doing print jobs, or book illustrations or work for clothing or whatever it may be… I love that variety. But as I’ve said above live work is great fun, it takes you places and you see new things and meet so many new faces… so I do hope I continue to be able to work on such projects.

UKSA: What’s coming up for MEGAMUNDEN?

MM:  A bunch of stuff… to name a few things I’m really excited  about.

- I’ve just finished a T-shirt for howies
- I’m soon to begin working on a book of tattoo illustrations that will come out next year and should hopefully be stocked globally.
- a few bits of branding work are going on at MEGA HQ at the moment so which is a bit different for me, makes a nice change.
- I did some work for Nike Snowboarding a month or so ago and the results of that will be released later this year which I’m really excited about.
- and lastly I’m currently in talks regarding a project that might involve me wrapping an entire plane in graphics… so fingers crossed for that.

Cheers guys.

MEGAMUNDEN

megamunden.com
ilovedust.com
@olliemunden

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We sat down with UK Streetwear brand Anyforty’s head honcho Al Wardle to hear what the brand has been working on.

UKSA: Anyforty have managed to commission some amazing street inspired artists for your ranges (Richt, Gorey, J3 Concepts, Zombiecorp) is the street art style something that heavily influences AnyForty?

AW: I wouldn’t say AnyForty is heavily influenced by street art, i’d say AnyForty was built from a love of illustration and showcasing the work of artists we love, be that guys who spent there day’s can in hand painting up walls or artists who sit hunched over a bit of paper with a pencil. If the artwork is sick, we don’t care if it’s painted on a wall, printed out on a A3 digital poster, covering a vinyl toy, or handrawn on the back of a cornflakes box. Good inspirational work is just that, whatever medium it’s on.

UKSA: Tell us about the T-world project?

AW: The T-world project is a interesting one, I’ve known Eddie Zammit of T-world for a few years now, i’m from a editorial design background and he produces the world’s only T-shirt journal so we clicked with a love of print design and tees.

I worked with him as a client a year ago when i left my previous job as Art Director of Computer Arts Projects Mag, I designed all the branding and display graphics for a event he was putting on in Sydney called Next, he opened my eyes to some incredible Australian artists and i was hooked by the scene, I had to get some of these guys involved in AnyForty. Originally I was going to include a few Aussie artists as part of  the range of collaborative tees i drop called the Versus series alongside artists from the UK and overseas.  But after thinking about it, i thought fuck it, let’s just do a full range together. We worked for about 5 months, getting a great line up of artists and planning the drop, a bulk of the time was spent producing the mini books that come with each tee. A 24 page mini book, showcasing personal work from the respective artists alongside a exclusive interview.

The range dropped a few weeks ago and is selling steadily, it’s our biggest drop yet and we produced twice as much stock as normal, the range launched with a New York launch party as part of a series of 10 events T-world we’re doing over stateside and we recently dropped a promo video produced by the incredible Broken Antler.

UKSA: What does being a UK company mean to you?

AW: Personally, being a UK company is a incredibly proud thing for me, I’ve always said first coming from Newcastle, i’m a Geordie first, British second, but as part of this streetwear/clothing game, whatever you want to call it, I’m proud to be one of only a handfull of companies doing there thing against the masses and masses of US brands our stores are full of. I’m proud of being from the UK, based in the UK and producing my tees in the UK, and being stocked in stores across the UK.

We still need UK customers to support some of there own though, kids these days would rather hand over £30 to buy a tee from OnlyNY or Obey (both brands I love by the way, not hating just observating!), that’s worn by thousands of kids worldwide rather than hunt out more niche independent brands like ourselves who are only printing much smaller numbers of stock and are producing stuff just as good as our US elders. But i don’t blame the kids, when i was a teenager i was spending loads of coin on brands like Champion, Stussy and Zoo York. We idolise the US as part of our culture and you can’t blame em.

Saying that, it’s up to more stores to take chances on brands like ourselves, if you don’t put us on the racks alongside the bigger brands, then it’s harder for people to find out about UK brands. That’s why i’ve so much respect for people like Dan from Urban Industry, Sibs from Focus and Mark from The Chimp Store, all store owners taking a chance on people like me, and seeing that we can sell alongside hype brands.

UKSA: What’s coming up for AnyForty?

AW: At the moment i’m still kinda deep in this current range, AnyForty is a one man brand, i don’t work on it full time, do freelance client work to keep that London rent paid, so done the hard work getting the product produced and out there, but i just need to keep focus on keeping the brand in front of people, these days people (me included) got short attention spans so i’m keeping on top of the social media, hunting out new wholesale accounts, basically doing the fucking lot!

But product wise, next for us, we’re planning out our follow up to last years crewneck collection, and we’ll be dropping 5 new crewnecks around Sept/Oct time, we’re continuing our foray into self publishing by releasing Teeology 2 in December, and we’ll also be dropping a few other cheeky accessories once we can afford it ; )

Check out the AnyForty site here.

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The post AnyForty Interview appeared first on UK Street Art.

As the newest addition to UKSA, I wanted to write a post to introduce myself and say a big thanks for the invite.

With a background in design & illustration, I’m hoping to be able to contribute with interviews & features on the UK street art scene and crossovers that bleed into illustration, product design and gallery work.

Living in Brighton, I’m also hoping to be able to cover some of the exciting stuff going on here like the recent MCA tribute from MSK/Heavy Artillery along with pieces from other local talent.

Thanks again and looking forward to contributing!

Matt Buchanan

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