Si Gross makes collectable Pop Art based on people featured in headline news stories. It is a world full of truth and lies that he captures with a combination of sincere and satirical illustrations, drawn from real life situations. Si creates his designs through a process of photographs, digital or ink drawings, silk screen printing, spray cans and paint pens, switching between stark monochrome or painterly colours that are bold and dramatic. Another method he commonly employs is聽the layering of paint onto a photographic background, essentially planting a cartoon world into a real life situation. Each print聽has slight variations, and comes in limited editions on various surfaces. We speak with Si.
A: You often use vivid colours in your work, how does this complement the themes in聽your art?
厂骋:听I use vivid colours to encompass the drama of the situations displayed. Those colours also聽bring out the eccentric and bold personalities of the people illustrated in the picture.
A: What is it about celebrity culture that you find interesting?
厂骋:听All the truth and lies in stories, jumbled up together. Fame as a propaganda tool can be聽used by public figures to manipulate the general public into buying into their brand, mostly聽administered by PR companies. It’s absurd that people are now a brand.聽I prefer to concentrate on stories about iconic public figures. People that have a significant聽control over their own image, like the Queen.聽The fanatical drama surrounding famous people keeps celebrity culture ticking over.聽Before I photographed the news I worked in security. I watched and chuckled, as a聽celebrity refused to go outside because there weren’t enough fans waiting for them. As a聽photographer, I was swept up while recording a wild scene, where ecstatic fans ran amok聽in a shopping centre, after they got wind of a backdoor exit. Without devoted fans, fame聽withers away.
A: You focus on photography with the use of silk screen, paint and ink. What is it about聽this combination that interests you as an artist?
厂骋:听It’s the transformative process of turning something digital into something I can touch.聽I use my digital camera as a journal, collecting a lot of photos. Sometimes certain images聽jump out for further inspection and transformation. I start sketching digitally on an iPad.聽Aferwards it becomes a large scale drawing made in Photoshop. Then I like to see my聽designs embossed on a surface.聽I鈥檓 drawn to silk screen, paint and ink because it allows repetition of motif and gives fast,聽simple colour changes that deliver a tactile hand finish. I’m not convinced by my work if it’s聽just on the flat surface of a digital print.
A: What issues in society do you attempt to expose through the satirical nature of your聽practice?
厂骋:听To bring the underbelly of society to the surface. I want to follow up on interesting聽investigations forgotten by the press. From working in the media, I see that breaking a聽story can sometimes take over from a more thorough investigation. This in effect can kill聽off a story.聽On the flip-side, I draw to celebrate the eccentric dreamers. I believe good news and bad聽news should come in equal measures.
A: What are your key artistic influences, and how do you hope your work will evolve in聽the future?
厂骋:听I’m influenced by headline news, ancient culture, criminal investigations and patterns in聽nature; combination of subjects that should keep me busy for many years to come.聽What I’m looking at now, is the way headline news is buried under less damaging but still聽sensational stories. I see a smoke-screen to protect the interests of another entity.聽Specifically I’m making a series on the mounting evidence of organ harvesting in China. Former Police Chief Wang Lijun, disguised as an elderly聽lady, attempted to seek聽sanctuary and entered a US Embassy in Chengdu. He ratted out his boss Bo Xilai, leaking聽all kinds of confidential information. Bo had tracked him down using Wang’s mobile phone聽and surrounded the Embassy. Wang was handed over and then debriefed.聽The story that rose to the top in the West was Bo Xilai’s wife, Gu Kalai murdering聽businessman Neil Heyward. This avoids the bigger picture. That being, both Bo and Wang聽Lijun were believed to be key pioneers and perpetrators in organ harvesting of prisoners of聽conscience such as Falun Gong and Tibetans. Their faction boss was former Chinese聽leader Jiang Zemin.聽I’m illustrating this from a book called The Slaughter – Mass killings, organ harvesting, and聽China’s secret solution to its dissident problem by Ethan Gutmann. Some stories involve a聽deeper investigation that doesn’t fit into a 24 hour news cycle. They get lost in the system. I聽want to help uncover and make sense of this story with macabre illustrations and fitting聽propaganda style slogans.
View more of Si鈥檚 work at聽
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Credits
1. Si Gross, Flowerclava II, 2015. Courtesy of the artist.
2. Si Gross, The Liz Gang, 2015. Courtesy of the artist.
