Antony Micallef

Antony Micallef recently had an exhibition "It's A Wonderful World", Oct. 6-28, at London's Lazarides Gallery. Since winning 2nd prize in the B.P. Portrait Awards in 2000, his work, an edgy mix of graffiti, graphic art and bubblegum pop, has been highly received with sold out shows and mentions in such prestigious publications as the New York Times. He continues to accrue fans and can list several A-lisers such as Jude Law, R.E.M.'s Michael Stipe and Brit bad-boy Robbie Williams as clients.

Starting Sept. 2008 and ending March 2010, his pieces will be exhibited as a part of the British museums world tour through Europe and Asia. Micallef's work fits perfectly with the show's function and goal to show the symbiotic nature of the art between the two continents. He is highly influenced by his travels in Japan and it's pop culture. In an interview with Scene 360 he says "“My senses had been heavily immersed in fluffy pink, Japanese cartoon characters, neon cities and shit ‘J-pop.’"

This Asian aesthetic is applied to American and British icons such as McDonalds, Gucci, MTV and Disney. These familiar brands and logos are posited amongst eerily disturbing figures of angels and devils, weaponry and anthropomorphic animals. While the logo's themselves are banal and have been used ad nauseum in contemporary art, its Micallef's way of blending these other elements that create an image that is simultaneously disturbing and attractive. Thrown together on a faceless figure, they represent how we, as a collective society, identify who we are as individuals. I could be this person, you could be this person: it is pop culture in neon; it is the perfect expression of his message: how corporate consumerism is so despised by society and yet so seductitive.

Ben Austin and Godfrey Barker comment about its mission, “Fifty years on, artists see the consumer culture very differently. They smell malaise. They see global multi-nationals eating us up — Coke, Nike, Texaco, those all-pervasive brand names from which nobody can escape. They see life packaged from your shoes to your DVDs to your pop idols to your holiday in Ibiza. After death and taxes, they see brand names as the biggest facts of life. (…) Everyone does. We are all alienated consumers. We despise the thing we love. We accept the consumer gods as integral to our lives, but we resent them. At the same time we can’t imagine what we'd do without them. They validate us, they give us status, define us, make us feel we belong. (…) Perverse Pop is saying: Coke, Big Macs, Marlboros, Levis, Reeboks, they have become the new global Big Brother. They follow you wherever you go. They fuck you up; they tell you what to do. They stifle individuality with pre-packaged lifestyles. (…) Nobody knows. But artists are now fighting for identity, space and air. Art is emerging as the strongest protest against the uniform cultural scene. (…) It’s a lonely and packaged world. Fact and fiction are blurred. News is entertainment. Time Magazine found in 1962 that the average American was exposed to 1600 ads and brand names a day. What escape now? There are 77 channels on the telly, the universe is at the end of a mouse-click, Big Macs are on sale in 200 countries — and just who are you?”

Brief Bio: London based artist Antony Micallef studied Fine Arts at the University of Plymouth, and currently lives and works as an artist and graphic designer in Brighton, UK.