Supreme’s latest collection will feature the work of the late, great visual artist Mike Kelley, founding member of experimental proto-punk band Destroy All Monsters and regular Sonic Youth collaborator.
Kelley, who died in 2012 at the age of 57, is regularly and accurately described as one of his generation’s most important artists. Working through performance, sculpture, drawing and mixed-media installations, often using discarded objects, his art had a sense of disaffected teenage lament. Kelley’s work was a sardonic challenge to cultural norms, a wry middle finger to middle-class consumerism. But everything he made, however playful and naive seeming — giant balls of stitched together soft toys hanging from a ceiling, crude drawings of trash — was layered with complex philosophical explorations. He delved into the polarities of innocence and experience, and questioned ideas of cleanliness versus filth.
Some of Kelley’s most well-known imagery features in the new Supreme collection, including a photograph of an orange knit toy made cult-famous when it graced the cover of Sonic Youth’s 1992 album Dirty. The image forms part of a work titled Ahh… Youth, which has been cut up and used across various pieces in the collection. You can cop a piece of this Mike Kelley homage in the form of a skateboard, hoodie, T-shirt, shirt or work jacket. It will all be on Grailed in no time, so get queuing.
The collection drops on 6 September at Supreme’s Paris, London, LA and New York locations.
