Traversing the boundaries of Fine Art, Illustration, and Graffiti,
Young revels in his inability to be pigeonholed. Finding inspiration in
the work of both Classical and Contemporary Art masters, as well as
various cannons of popular culture, his finely detailed pointillist
style portraits are a trademark of his studio work. Rendered
predominantly in spray paint, Young’s primary medium of choice points to
years of dedication to bombing the streets as a writer – an endeavor
committed to alongside years of formal art training.
Keeping separate his Graffiti and Fine Art guises, Alex Young, the
artist, draws upon the similarly rich dichotomy’s evident in other
pseudonymous individuals. His subjects include a burlesque dancer,
S&M model, and heavy metal guitarist to name but three, whose
alternate identities are all revealed through the fine illustrative
detail and multi-layered symbolism evident, on closer inspection, within
his monolithic portraits. Essentially, Young is reaffirming the age-old
adage that one shouldn’t judge a book by it’s cover; in turn condemning
the widespread societal prejudice exhibited when confronted by these
individuals.
A graduate of Kent Institute, and recognized as one of the UK’s top
60 most talented University leavers by Creative Review magazine in 2002,
Young resided in Brighton for seven years, working predominantly as a
freelance illustrator, before relocating to South London in early 2010,
where he currently lives and works