THE IDEAL - CRETIN AND WHORE

Here is another image inspired by one of the deriding slogans from the original Enartete Kunst exhibit in Munich, 1937. "The Ideal - Cretin and Whore", along with "An insult to German Womanhood", were slogans used to describe works of art that certain Nazi art/cultural theorists felt graphically expressed base sexuality and exalted people of the lower classes, likes pimps, prostitutes, idiots etc, above the German bourgeoisie. In the exhibit these slogans largely referred to the work of Otto Mueller and Ernst Ludwig Kirchner.

I was interested in these two judgments, the cretin and the whore, but was at a loss at how to portray them (without defaulting to stereotypes), or how to incorporate them into a composition. At first there was just a single character, and various attempts were made using different compositions, poses, colour schemes etc., but it never seemed right. It came together when I added a second character, each symbolizing one of the ideas.

The cretin is located at the bottom of frame. Her features: the submissive pose, the blank expression, the cool colour scheme (with an almost sickly green), are meant to represent her stunted, or limited mental nature. The whore, with her more open posing, and the red based colour speaks to her sexual nature, but the desaturation and her inversion indicates that this apparent promiscuity is excessive, forced, unbalanced.

The hit of red represents the anger and intensity of these words, this judgement. The red is splattered on the page, representing how quickly theses judgements can be made, and how the effects of these ideas can bleed out in unanticipated ways. The orchids growing out of these trails represent the true strength and beauty contained within these individuals that is obscured by the judgements placed upon them.

HIGH 5 - "5th"

Since there were five boards in this series I had to create a fifth top sheet image. While this image is not considered part of the Hexagram series, and is exclusive to Endeavor, I did follow the same elemental inspiration for it's conception and design. The colour, and symbology all relate to the spirit element and has hits of the other four colours representing that this element is the embodiment of the other four combined.

I've included the two top sheets that I created for this fifth board. The female one was done first, but I was then asked to change this (along with the yellow/air Hexagram image), to a male for the sake of the "jibbers". I've also included the base graphic, which is actually a chunk of the second Entartete Kunst image, "Milkcow" (see below), re purposed, as I was running out of time to get these done!

HIGH 5

Endeavor Snowboards used my Hexagram Series (see below), for the graphics on their High 5 board for their 2010/2011 line up. The images were perfect for boards, with their long vertical compositions, and the helmets fitting so well into the nose of the board. The top two images come from the new Endeavor catalogue, and the boards will be released late summer/early fall 2010.

The third image is the final the design comp (that's why they are all the same length and have the same info.), where you can see the graphics a little better. The images had to change a little for production. Some changes were minor, like lengthening the bottom of the images to fit the board dimensions, while others were quite extreme, such as changing the female form on the yellow image to a male. This was done as the Board of Directors at Endeavor felt that the gnarled old male faces would be more appealing to the the target market for this particular board ("jibbers" I believe they called them).

Thanks to Endeavor for making this happen, and thanks to Max Jenke and Rob Dow at Endeavor for their time and feedback.

Photos by Scott Serfas, courtesy of Endeavor Snowboard Design.