The red sticker is good.
That’s what I learned at age 5 at the Home of Economy in Minot, ND. Stickers meant something. I had my eye on a Six Million Dollar Man doll which was too expensive, but the price tag slashing the toy’s price made it attainable to my Mom, and therefore me.
I understood:
• Stickers altered the value and meaning of things.
• They were coded with colors and symbols that translated into actions.
• They seemed to be everywhere.
I got my first skateboard at age 10 and stickers became a way to communicate without having to speak. You knew the bands I liked (or wanted to be known to like), phrases I used, brands I consumed, all by checking out my deck. Wearing my jeans jacket covered in sew-on patches, I was a walking and riding billboard.
As a teenager visiting Minneapolis and New York City my head kept spinning because stickers were everywhere: phone booths, street signs, subway posters, bike racks. Some slick and shiny. Others made with Sharpies on stolen USPS labels.
Around the same time I made my first sticker collages on my notebooks, binders and the front of the kick drum on my drum kit, using what I could get out of gum-wrappers, hardware stores and the local record shops.
I’ve collected stickers for nearly 30 years, eventually creating my own sticker designs and combining them with commercially made stickers, wrapping objects, doors, furniture and dozens of laptop and phone cases.
Throughout my career when I’ve been presented with a creative brief or object or surface to work on, I immediately think about music or bands or songs that I can listen to while creating and I make playlists when I’m working on a series of images. I dig into my Art and Design History education to apply brainstorming processes like William Burrough’s (and later David Bowie’s) Cut Up Method or visual technique Cadavre exquis (exquisite corpse).
I started to draw around the time I started talking, and my life has been filled with visual art and music ever since. I’ve been playing the drums since age 6. Back then my cool sisters’ record collections filled my head with stories and rhythms and my obsession with comic books and drawing gave me an outlet to create and apply my inspirations. Visual art and music go together. Stickers make them travel.