Ever wonder where the iconic bathroom figure comes from?
That little guy that broke communication boundaries by distilling hundreds of translations into one visual message? I hadn’t, he’d simply always been a part of my life, alongside his female contemporary.
Until I heard from the Persona Art Project team.
Consisting of two brothers, Shayne and Ant Vervoort, Persona Art Projects creates a series of artworks that are all wonderfully similar, yet beautifully different.
Hand-drawn by artist and architect Ant, the idea began as a technical challenge – the ability to draw a character that looked good at the scale of a Google image search, but equally good blown up the size of a building. As final images, they look simple, but the process was very difficult,“ and it took Ant a year and a half to draw the first one.
The irresistibly quirky drawings use that very universal icon of the bathroom figure as a template. Ant then adds personal effects that conjure up characters you’ll recognise in an instant, by abstracting characters down to their essentials – those components that we love the most, that make them who they are. Think Ron Burgundy and his red velvet suit and killer mustache. Mandela with his salt and pepper hair and colorful shirts.
The first phase is a Kickstarter crowdfunding project which launched on September 22nd with the hopes of funding their first exhibition further down the line.
“It’s not just about raising the money – it’s about developing a community that believes in the same things we do,” Shayne said. “It’s about developing a following behind the art movement.”
“We are all so different and unique as people, and yet across countries and cultures, we have similarities that tie us all together,” continues Ant. “That’s what Persona is about: being wonderfully similar, and beautifully different.”
How to get involved?
Follow Persona Project on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter to keep up to date with the progress of their Kickstarter campaign.
But more than that support the initiative. There are cool ways to back them on Kickstarter, ranging from 1EUR up until 99EUR with rewards that include social media packages through to printed persona prints and a pack of persona postcards shipped to backers, just in time for those holiday-season gifts.
I just love the Persona Art that Ant did of Tuscan and I, shown above.
Watch this video for more info and connect with the team should you have any questions.
