The Misterio Tremendum

For a long time project (red) was kinda’ lame. An interesting Idea. Good intentions. But just not the kind of stuff that you would actually pick up and wear. And it felt like the only place you can get the stuff was at the Gap… and honestly, who shops at the Gap? (The company has tanked over the past few years with the rest of clothing retail and has consciously given up trying to court any kind of hip niche, moving towards over-sized, overpriced threads for 30-somethings in the suburbs.) Fortunately over the past few months this well-meaning project has removed its Gap albatross and moved closer the to where it needs to be - building up its high/street-fashion cultural cache. In doing so they have enlisted a number of artists to take part in (red)-sponsored events. For instance, this past valentines day $42.58 million was raised at a Sotheby’s auction that Damian Hirst, among others, put together to benefit project (red). He contacted a number of artists asking them to contribute works inspired by the color red and the concept of love. The artists included Takashi Murakami, Ed Ruscha, Richard Prince, Marc Quinn, Banksy, Jeff Koons and Andreas Gursky, to name a few. Hirst himself included 7 works that sold for $19 million and change in total. Great idea. Making buck and empowering the “(red)” name.

Also of interest is the 1HUND(RED) artists initiative with Converse, a brand with some serious street cred of late. This initiative asks 100 different artists to design their own Converse shoe, which they then produce in limited number. 10% of the wholesale price is then donated to (red). Caught the story on SuperTouch a little while back with Dr. Romanelli’s contribution.

And by the way, SuperTouch got a total redesign recently… looks good. Maybe change that banner. The contributor line-up is pretty incredible - James Jean, Lupe Fiasco, Jamie O’Shea (editor), and Dr. Romanelli, among many, many others. Taking an incredible blog to the next level. The site is definitely still in the works, but so far so good. And speaking of reworks, my man Dr. Tron over at The Aesthetic Poetic gave the site a face-lift. Really clean looking, a lot of nice white space. Classy.