An emerging story of KAWS
Kaws, whose actual name is Brian Donnelly is an American artist and designer who sculpts, paints and design toys and cartoon characters. Best known for designing limited edition of clothes and toys, he is also recognized worldwide for exhibiting his art work in some of the world renowned museums and galleries. Blurring the line between commercial arts and fine arts, KAWS has managed to keep himself away from the exclusiveness of the art world by creating a more niche art market. All his art pieces have a stroke of pop art with a touch of culture permeate that are meant to be surpassing the different cultures and languages.
Born in the Jersey city of New Jersy, KAWS did her graduation from the School of Visual Arts in New York along with her Bachelors of Fine Arts in illustration. After completing her education, he then briefly works as a freelancer animator at Disney. There he used to paint backgrounds for the films like 101 Dalmatians, Doug and Daria. After serving Disney for a while he then started his career as a graffiti artist. In 1990’s he moved to New York city where he started suppressing images on phone booth and bill board advertisement and bus shelter.
In his initial days of struggle his work remained unnoticed but as he gained popularity, his work also started becoming more sought after. By the end of 1990’s he then got an opportunity with the Japanese clothing line, Bounty Hunter to design and produce a limited edition of vinyl toys which soon became popular among the global art toy collecting community. After this he has also collaborated with other Japanese companies like Bathing Ape and Santastic from where his work gained more widespread respect and popularity.
Among his many art and sculptures, some of his appreciable collaborations are:
· He has designed the clothes and toys for companies like Original Fake, Kung Faux, Comme des Garcons, vans, Undercover and Nike.
· He has also reworked on many famous television and cartoon characters like SpongeBob SquarePants, The Simpsons, The Smurfs, The Michelin Man and Mickey Mouse.
· His company has also redesigned the moon man statue of MTV for their 2013 MTV Video music awards.
· He has also designed bottles for Hennessy and Dos Equis.
Besides this, KAWS is also known for her acrylic paintings and sculptures. His most famous sculpture of gray scale clown like figure that resemble the Mickey Mouse with his face covered by his hands gained so much popularity that it was then incorporated into a balloon of 2012’s Thanks giving Parade. In 2014, KAWS also collaborated with Pharrell Williams to design the perfume bottle “Girl”. Then in 2016, he joined up with Uniqlo, a clothing brand to produce a line of low priced tees and accessories.
