I remember that it was about 1996. There used to be some nice edged shops on Beverly Blvd. in LA and the two most-known ones were “naked” and “K-bond”. Both shops used to import and carry the t-shirts I developed although they were pricey as imported from Japan. Both mainly carry fashion items but the K-bond focused much more on art and culture so I soon became friends with owner couple, Karen and James. (James’ real name is James Bond and he became the owner of the popular sneaker shop “Undefeated” later on). One day, Karen asked me “Do you know Geoff MsFetridge?” then “I’ve never heard the name.”, I replied. She strongly recommended to check his show at the George’s gallery which was owned by the owner of the X-Large but when I went there, the show was already over.

Finally, I could see Geoff’s show at the “Houston” in Seattle, which was internationally well known gallery-shop as it was quite edged. I was surprised and strongly attracted at the same time when I was touched every elements of his works such as lines, layouts and balance were so perfect that no one can touched to make it even better. His recent works are more interplay and internally calm and spiritual but that time, I think his works were more pop.

Soon after, I had an opportunity to see him at his studio in Glendale. (Glendale is also know as “At Water Village” which I really love this name) While we were talking, One of the wall posters looked so interested and I could hardly get rid of it from my brain. Cute bear sits at the bar counter with the glass and holding cigarette above the message “I’m Rockin’ On Your Dime”, all drawn in white above red background. It had a similar feeling as Yoshitomo Nara whom I worked with that time. Cute image but spicy ironical and cynical message behind. At the end of conversation, I plucked up and asked him, “Can we do t-shrit with this?” then “Sure.” he replied. (this t-shrit became so popular)

After being his studio several times, I had an opportunity to looked his black-books which had thousands of his random sketch drawings and I could see how each images are developed in time drawing so many times. I learned two things from this. One is that quality of artworks is in direct proportion to the numbers you draw. Also, great artworks can be produced only by hands in initial stage of development. As long as I was touched with perfection of every elements of his works, my thoughts became stronger and stronger as “Geoff will become a designer like Paul Rand and Saul Bass.”

In 2000, I moved to Santa Monica. One morning, I drove out to go to work and hit the freeway. There was a billboard with the Pepsi ad. When I looked at it, I immediately thought as THIS IS Geoff’s work. So I called and asked Geoff about it and “Yeah, I did.” he replied. It was Pepsi’s nation wide ad campaign. In this huge scale of ad campaign, how many graphic artists / art directors can create works which people who know his/her works can tell whose work it is. Probably very few.Geoff works on various animations and the title sequences of Sophia Coppola’s “Virgin Suicide” and the title sequence and graphics of the Spike Jonze’s “Where The Wild Things Are” are done by Geoff.

Geoff loves skateboarding and runs the skateboard brand “Solitary Arts” with his partner, Yong-Ki Chang. He is an excellent skater himself and he also enjoys long-board surfin’. His home point is in Ventura where the Patagonia’s headquarter is. He also loves bicycling, and surprisingly he won the LA’s bicycle race and became champion. Geoff resides in LA with his wife, 2 lovely daughters and the dog. Someday, I would love to surf with him possibly in Ventura. If I do it, I am going to buy the Anderson board with single fin.

Geoff McFetridge (b. 1971)
McFetridge is a artist based in Los Angeles California. Born in Canada, he was schooled at the Alberta College of Art and the California Institute of the Arts. He is part of the Beautiful Losers Exhibition, and makes solo exhibitions from Los Angeles, Berlin, Paris, London, the Netherlands and Japan. Instinctively ignoring creative boundaries McFetridge is a  truly multidisciplinary artist. From poetry to animation, from graphics to large scale sculpture, from textile and wallpaper to paintings, McFetridge has complete control over a variety of divergent disciplines.

In the field of Graphic Design, McFetridge won public acclaim when he was still a student, winning awards from the Art Directors Club and ID magazine for his student work. From 1996 to 1998, he was art director of the famous underground Beastie Boys magazine Grand Royal. He then founded the design studio Champion Graphics with which he has serviced for numerous international clients, while independently pursuing projects as an artist.

McFetridge has created a double helix of personal and commercial art projects, blending disciplines and purpose in almost every project he does.

“McFetridge is well-known within the graphic design community for imagery that is economical and spare, yet powerfully communicative. Geoff developed motifs echo themes found in sculpture, such as the relationship between man-made and natural forms, the interplay between two and three dimensional space and visual conundrums”
- Michael Darling, Seattle Art Museum Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art.

“He is part of a new generation of designers who are eager to leap the old divides between image and product, design and art, the flat page and the moving image.”
- Paul Warwick, Director, Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum

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