Gringz
aka Henrique Lima is a 25.01 year old boy, has been a member since November 7, 2005, has scored 1190 submissions, giving an average score of 3.26.
honestly, i can't see why this one was printed over yours. yours is much better AND subbed before. Plus, that other one looks like it has been cut out straight from a bonsay picture, added in a dude on a ladder and done. meh!
wow dude, i just checked your website - is that your stuff as well!? incredible, you show a remarkable different side of yourself there (i'm assuming p-shop stuff) while you already have a very remarkable style here!
it works well as a visual pun. i know its a good design when i go 'why didnt i think of that first?' sure it seems simple. Well, non of us thought of dripping paint and calling it art, Mr Pollock did. so credit goes to Mr Hammond.
There's a certain economy of means, a certain minimal understatedness to it. It's not about an over-the-top showcasing of one's virtuouso dexterity with Adobe's vector software. the craft shouldn't overshadow the concept.
The Howling Bells cover is totally unrelated, the tree there isn't a bonsai. The joke here is the absurdity of juxtaposition, the surprise from changing the meaning of what might as well be a vectorised photo of an everyday bonsai plucked off the net (probably isn't) ,by playing with scale. the bonsai is a symbol of the rampant minituraisation in japanese society but here it is a 'giant' bonsai. A visual oxymoron. I smiled.
i like the treatment of the ladder element as a device to suggest a sense of depth in the 2-d medium of the flat t-shirt. the concept needs a sense of physical 3d hugeness to the bonsai. everything fits together seamlessly, including the technical execution.
i like the colour combo too.
still i admire your style Gringz, i think its unique and has a certain polish and stylistic maturity. kampatei!!! I would wish to be that good.
i find it hard to think of these two shirts as "the same", just because they both have a bonsai tree in them. the thick lines and flat color fills in bonzai fishing are very cartoon-like; that plus the obvious joke of the troll fishing in the coffee, and then the little touches like the mushrooms, makes this a nearly purely "new-school" kind of pleasure. boisai gardener, on the other hand, has a much subtler joke to it, and more of an old-school single-color kind of pleasure to the graphic. don't get me wrong. i gave gringz's sub a 5$, which i rarely do. i gave matt's a 4$. it's just that you don't have to dislike the one in order to like the other, you know? i don't imagine they were ever "in competition" in threadless's mind.