Hello, who are you?

I’m FailureOne, an Austin based artist who’s been working outdoors for about a decade. In addition to my personal work, I’m the Art Director for MadGods clothing, and recently began adding photography to my repertoire. I started painting graffiti and skateboarding in 1993 and in the early 2000′s I started putting my first Failure posters up around the streets of Houston. It was never meant to be a name, but people started referring to the work as being put up by “The Failure,” so it continues on to this day.

Which out of photography, graffiti and design have you grown to love more over the years you’ve been involved in each field?

There are a lot of similarities between them. It’s just as much of a rush, and a challenge, to show up to a photo shoot with a girl I have never met in person and get the pictures I want from the situation as it is to be hanging upside-down from a tall building with my life and feet in a friend’s hands! Design is something that has a very meditative process for me, it’s like trying to decipher a secret code; trying to predict how much of “Me” a client really wants in their product. At the moment I’m really into photography, especially documenting my artist friends, as they climb the ladder to success – but nothing compares to the relief of crawling into bed next to my girlfriend after a long night of wandering around the city in blackness.

Yeah I can imagine, have you had many dodgy moments while you’ve been out painting?

A few here and there…I spent an hour laying in poison ivy and fire ants on the corner of a roof, waiting for the searchlights to go away, almost fell off a billboard. The worst part is when it’s late though; the streets are empty, and random, sketchy people try to approach you. A couple years ago, myself and two other artists were postering, when a car full of thuggish looking dudes pulled up, got out with masks and hands in their waistbands – they wanted to know what crew we were with, and who was crossing them out. Once they realized we weren’t who they were looking for though they just snatched a handful of our prints and took off.

And recently you’ve been getting more in to design right? Where did the skate deck hook-ups come from?

Well after months of searching, we found a manufacturer who was willing to make small runs of our board designs. We have access to commercial screen-printing, so we can make one-offs as samples, and if we feel strongly about it, we send the art off to be printed on boards in bulk. It’s been a loooong time coming, but we are dropping new designs every couple months.

Have you been collaborating with any other companies on clothing or boards or anything else?

Yeah I’ve done some work for FastFolks Cyclery, a fixed-gear shop here in Texas, as well as No-Comply Skate-shop and Dickies. Oh and I was asked to submit some art for an upcoming vinyl toy release from Jamungo.

Sick, have you got anything else exciting coming up other than that?

Yeah, I just released a new magazine, PureFilth, it’s a photography magazine all about girls and graffiti. It’s quarterly, and each issue features one model, and one artist. The next one will be out very soon, just in time for the Magic Tradeshow in LasVegas this August, which MadGods will be attending. There may also be a solo show at SeventySeven Gallery later this year as well.

flickr.com/failure1

www.madgods.com

This entry was tagged as ART., austin, failureone, fastfolks cyclery, graffiti, houston, jamungo, madgods, Photo, photography., purefilth, texas.