NIKE
If it ain’t broke don’t fix it – reinvent it instead.
I remember once queuing up at my local supermarket; milk, eggs and orange juice in hand. As you can probably gather, it was morning time and I was looking to rustle up some breakfast. On leaving the shop and unlocking my bike, an angry looking man, who had been waiting just behind me in the grocery queue, approached me as I struggled with my D-lock.
He said…
“You do realise that by wearing those trainers you are endorsing one of the biggest corporate monsters on the planet?”
I said…
“What?”
He replied…
“Nike represents everything that is wrong with the world today.”
Before I had time to respond he strode off proudly; broadsheet and croissants in tow. It was like he had done his good deed of the day.
Bemused, it took me a little while to fully grasp what I had just experienced. My initial reaction was ‘what a d**k’, but moreover, my second thought was ‘surely that idiot isn’t planning on dedicating his entire day to marching around Cambridge telling people off for wearing Nike apparel, and if not, why did he target me?’
Then it dawned on me…
The reason he’d singled me out was because the Air Max 90 Infrareds on my feet were both boxfresh and GLORIOUS. He was like a magpie to a a shiny object, drawn to the flame pink accents. In the end I took his brief tirade as a compliment and cycled off with a semi-smile on my face, deep in thought about how I was going to best prepare the aforementioned eggs.
Ironman champion Mark Allen in the original Nike Air Max 90 ‘Infrared’ campaign.
There are things in this world that must be heralded, but moreover, celebrated as brilliant, especially when anniversaries roll around. Nike’s 25 years of innovative 'Air Max’ footwear is one of those consistently excellent things. Iconic, innovative and groundbreaking, the most beautiful thing about the Air Max range is that the evolution of the shoe, both stylistically and technologically, will always represent something very different to every generation of sneaker head. A particular place in time if you will. As I mentioned previously, my first 'Infrared’ memory involves lazy days spent in sunny Cambridge in the late-nineties; broke but ALWAYS with flamboyant trainers on my feet.
To celebrate the 25th anniversary of Nike’s very own ‘air’, Nike is throwing parties, releasing limited edition colour ways but most interestingly, pioneering a series of artist commissions with an eye to ‘reinventing’ the legacy of their most celebrated creation.
Working with five artistic teams from different disciplines across London, Nike has challenged the artists to reinvent the five most iconic Air Max designs from the glittering roster.
Air Max 1
Air Max 90
Air Max 95
Air Max 97
Air Max 360
The task of reinventing the 90’s; arguably the most iconic of all the Air Max designs, has fallen upon the shoulders of design team Bruno Drummond and Gemma Tickle. Bonded by a mutual love for clean, crisp and flawless pop aesthetics, the duo have tapped directly into the era that played host to the OG Infrared for inspiration. The glorious explosion of rave culture, the dawn of a new take on urban style, but most significantly, the striking shapes, distinct use of colour and design, and not forgetting the legendary iconography that has shaped Nike as a brand since its birth in the late seventies.
We caught up with Bruno and Gemma to see how they went about reinventing our Nike Air Max in the form of a sculpture paying homage to its shape, colour and form.
HOW DO YOU GUYS FIND YOURSELF HERE TODAY WORKING AS A TEAM?
Bruno: Gemma and I met when we were both working for other people; Gemma was assisting a set designer and I was working as a photographic assistant and we found ourselves working on shoots together. We were both busy getting our own portfolios together around the same time so we started working collaboratively. Aesthetically we have tastes and interests that cross-over in a complimentary fashion.
TELL US ABOUT YOUR TAKE ON THIS NIKE COLLABORATION. WHERE HAS THE PROJECT TAKEN YOU AS A CREATIVE PARTNERSHIP?
Bruno: It’s been really great. We’ve had an amazing amount of creative freedom to develop this project ourselves. In the research phase especially, it’s been really interesting looking back at the era when the Air Max 90’s first came out.
Gemma: The thought of recreating something that already exists inspired by the rave scene in which it was born was a pretty great place to start, and having the creative control to finish up there too was even better.
HOW DO YOU APPROACH 'REINVENTING’ SOMETHING SO ICONIC?
Bruno: We were asked to come up with something relating to the cultural backdrop of the early nineties. Researching this has been really interesting, the rave aesthetic especially. Just the rave flyers alone chart the musical development of the scene and with the insane speed at which it seemed to evolve. 1986/87 saw a whole mixture of styles, not defined, quite DIY if you like, 1987/88 started to get more defined, it borrowed from the 1960’s a lot, quite Hawkwindy sometimes - that kind of thing.
As the music got harder in the early nineties the aesthetic of the flyers did too. The artwork became heavily computer generated and almost started moving towards a kind of Hellraiser aesthetic.
We really liked the way the flyers use space, kind of referencing, for want of a better term, void landscapes. You know, grids cascading from a horizon, that kind of sci-fi emptiness really appealed. We really liked the way the flyers had this consistent use of grid patterns, particularly the axial, one-point perspective throughout.
Although it hasn’t fed directly into the project some of the stuff the research has bought up has ended up with me looking at Lawnmower Man and films like that, plus early-nineties video game releases like Sonic The Hedgehog, which uses space in a really amazing way. Similar to that medieval period before they developed perspective but are using 3-D; so it becomes an odd blend of 2-D and 3-D.
Gemma: We really love computer game imagery and the world that encompasses. Linked to the Nike project, we tried to imagine what it would look like if this world was modernised and its building blocks were shapes taken from the Air Max 90 design.
LET’S TALK ABOUT THE LOVE SURROUNDING THE SHOE. DID YOU FIND THE PROSPECT OF REINVENTING IT DAUNTING?
Bruno: I’ve always been a big fan of the Infrared. We tried to respond as directly to the bold blocky colours of the design throughout developing the brief. That was always the aim.
Gemma: I think taking something that is so familiar means you can push it’s reinvention further.
HOW HAS YOUR RELATIONSHIP AS A SET DESIGNER AND PHOTOGRAPHER CHANGED OVER TIME AND HOW DID THE BRIEF TESTED YOUR RESOLVE?
Gemma: Well, we both share a very similar graphic and playful sensibility and I think working with Nike has encouraged both of those aesthetics.
WHAT ELSE INSPIRES YOU? WHERE DO YOU SOURCE INSPIRATION?
Bruno: Pop culture, illustration, graphic design, colour, minimalism, architecture. We probably overuse the word 'pop’ but I think it’s really important to what we both do. I’ve always been interested in glossy/surface sheen, guys like Jeff Koons. We both use a pop colour palette in our work, which I think works nicely with a minimalism and aesthetic austerity.
Gemma: I love looking at materials in everyday life and thinking of other ways to use them. I also love going to the library and looking at old issues of design and fashion magazines. I try to find interesting exhibitions and talks to find inspiration. Most recently, I went to this amazing show at the Wood Turners Guild called the 'The Wizardry of Wood’. It was great. I recommend it.
FINALLY, I WANT TO ASK YOU ABOUT YOUR TAKE ON THE 21ST CENTURY CLIMATE. THE BULGING AND SATURATED WORLD THAT WE LIVE IN. HOW DO YOU FEEL YOUR WORK STANDS OUT FROM THE NEVER-ENDING SCROLL?
Bruno: The scroll is interesting, the endless scrolling and sense of infinity. Saying that, some tumblr profiles are very well curated and selective. Some aren’t. I quite like to look at both in a way. For me, print is still the primary medium in terms of an endpoint for a personal project, and I definitely prefer looking at a printed magazine to a website, although that’s not to say digital isn’t a super important part of what we do.