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Airmagination Brings Hip Hop to Fashion
12/10/05 - LatinRapper.com exclusive interview
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Airmagination has quickly claimed its stake as the most
popular Latin-owned airbrushed clothing business in the
industry. Owner and artist Ray Sierra of the
Bronx, along with his fellow artists, are responsible
for the official Big Pun clothing line, and their work
can be seen at clubs, in the street, and on the walls of
50 Cent's home. Ray's company has introduced a new level
of high quality
airbrushed shirts at retail prices, he
takes time out of an an especially
busy month to speak with LatinRapper about his company.
Latinrapper.com: How long have you been in the
airbrushing business?
About 11 years now.
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How did you get started?
I bought a shirt off of somebody, and thought I could do
it, and that was it basically.
Did you teach yourself?
Yeah, I went and bought the inside guts of a compressor,
a cheap airbrush, and started airbrushing all my
clothes.
Most of your work obviously has a hip hop feel to it,
how has been a Bronx native influenced your art?
Basically you got all the graffiti writers, like the
best ones originated from here, in my opinion. You get
to see the best work, and you’re constantly surrounded
by the hip hop, the whole culture.
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What shirt design do you get the most requests for?
That’s a hard one. I would just say it varies, mostly
celebrity portraits. You got Biggie, Pac and Pun,
they’re in the top three.
Speaking of Pun, Your company did most of the designs
for the official Big Pun clothing, what was it like to
be involved with such a successful line?
It was definitely good, the shirts we created were on a
mass production level, it makes me proud to see people
accept it and your artwork.
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Are you involved with any other artist or official
clothing lines?
Yeah, Biggie line, Scarface, Godfather, City of God,
King of New York, Martin Luther King, Soulja Slim, Young
Jeezy, Al Capone and many more to come
So you obtained the rights to do the designs?
The company that pays for the license to the people that
own the estate, they come to us for a lot of artwork
that they want.
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You’re known to do murals, what were some of the more
significant pieces that you’ve done?
Definitely 50 Cents' house, right now I'm doing the BET.
office, 50 I would say was the pinnacle as far as
murals, besides that we done neighborhoods, a whole
building, barbershops, a lot of backdrops for different
people, including the one for Pun for his pool hall he
had in the Bronx.
If an artist or label outside of New York is looking
for a custom mural, are you available to meet that need?
Yeah, whether its custom murals, we definitely trying to |
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expand to any clothing line company out there that’s
looking for a nice little twist on an urban product.
Anything for any product that’s out there.
You previously had a shoe deal with Timberland, how
did that come about?
It wasn’t really a shoe deal, they had a contest where
they had a youth outreach program. Where its about
giving back to the hood, having artists from different
cities compete to represent their cities. And Kelvis
Polanco of Airmagination won the competition. Originally
they were supposed to reproduce the boots and part of
the sales would go to charity, but the time frame they
got it only made it to a few places. We went out
to meet the public, it was real cool.
You’re
presently working on your own clothing line, right?
Yeah, we just signed our deal, we got picked up by the
same company that put out the Pun line, Biggie line. The
line is called
So Hood clothing, its gonna be t-shirts
for men and women with very strong artwork covering
every aspect of the hood from good to bad. We gonna do
shirts at retail, what the public really wants to see
that other companies are scared to do. We’re gonna
push the envelope with the clothing line.
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Is So Hood out now?
That will be coming out this spring, look out for that,
we got a website coming up for that, sohoodclothing.com
Do you bump music to get into a particular mood when
doing a shirt or mural?
Yeah, the latest hot stuff, we listen to everything from
hip hop to alternative, rock, whatever.
What aspect of your work do you enjoy the most?
I would say coming up with an idea, creating that
initial sketch of something original, just like our
clothing line. |
Who were your influences while you made your way into
the airbrushing and art game?
When I first started out, the local guys who originally
airbrushed… maybe T-Rex, as I progressed it was guys I
would see in the magazines like Dru Blair, Steve
Driscoll.
You have a DVD on airbrush instruction, what kind of
feedback have you gotten from people with no airbrushing
experience who purchased it?
We got excellence feedback from people, the biggest
surprise to me was the respect we got from people who
were already artists. One guy had six years experience
and stuff he learned off my DVD helped him progress
immediately.
What’s your advice to aspiring airbrush artists who
might be reading this?
Stick with it, man. Keep practicing, just don’t give up.
Any last thoughts for readers?
No matter what it is, whether art or music, keep it
true, don’t stray away from that.
Airmagination on the web:
http://www.airmagination.com
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