Artist Anthony Petrie thinks the pop culture art scene has gotten a little stale. So many rehashes of the same ideas, same properties, with the same old techniques. This is art! Do something different! Be bold! And with his upcoming solo show — and a little help from the Predator — he’s doing just that.
The show is called chARTs 2, a follow-up to the 2015 show where Petrie took some of the most famous pop culture properties ever and turned them into all manner of maps and infographics. Among them was an iconic Jaws poster/nautical chart that became so popular he knew he had to raise the bar.
“Work on chARTs2 started as soon as the first show ended, so it’s been a long time in the making,” Petrie told us. “I feel like chARTs 1 was a proof of concept in way, wherein I was just trying to define what the theme was and what it could be. This show is a deeper exploration of the concept, and a much better marriage of concept and execution.”
Nothing in the show (that’s been revealed at least) does this better than Petrie’s poster for Predator, which we’re excited to exclusively reveal. Titled Extraction Plan, it’s printed with thermochromic, heat-reactive ink, so with a mere touch, the entire poster changes colours — and the Predator disappears. Check out a bit of the process in action:
“The Predator poster is nuts,” Petrie said. “When you touch it, Predator disappears, and the black around the border turns to red. I’m really excited about this one. Predator is my favourite movie, and I’m hoping that this material exploration will serve as inspiration for integrating meaningful features into posters for the industry as a whole. [The] best part is, it’s not even the coolest piece in the show.”
That hardly seems possible. This is what the poster looks like before you touch it:
And here are a few detail shots what happens after. Again, one touch — and the entire poster changes colours making the Predator blend into the background, just like in the movie.
It also highlights what Petrie was going for not just with this poster, but the entire show. Besides Predator, Petrie has posters for Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, The Grand Budapest Hotel, Rocky and several other movies. Then there’s these: First up is Chartzilla (you can probably guess the property).
This is Flight Plans, for Pixar’s Up.
And this is Roamer Road Map, inspired by The Walking Dead.
There are more pieces in the show too, and you can see them all when it opens at Gallery 1988 West at 7:00PM PT, September 3 (12:00PM AEST, September 4). The whole show will then go online the next day; follow @Galleries1988 on Twitter to be notified when it’s available for online perusing.