The Postman © Nick Pope Photography

We are delighted to kick off 2020 with a new collaboration with street artists The Postman.

The duo has been producing vibrant artworks based on their love of photography and music culture since they first meet in 2018. Many of their works live exclusively on the streets and they have developed a wide and adoring fan base, so we are thrilled to have worked with them on a special David Bowie print created exclusively for Rockarchive. The artwork is a collaboration with photographer Dave 'Hogie' Hogan who took the original image of David Bowie in 1985, backstage at Live Aid in London.

To help you get to know a bit more about The Postman, we asked them a few questions about their work, inspiration, and plans for the future.

David Bowie by The Postman in collaboration with David Hogan

How did the Postman come about? The Postman was born in Brighton in 2018 when two people met by chance and discovered a shared love for street art. We became best friends and have since set off on many adventures together. A classic case of - ‘the best things in life happen by chance’. 

How would you describe your work? Our work is a mixture of graffiti and pop art. It’s difficult to put into words. Many artists of all genres work with icons. But we aren’t aware of any in the street art world that work closely with the original photographers, which makes our work unique in that sense. It’s important for us to point out that it’s a true privilege and honour to have the trust of famous photographers to give their imagery the Postman ‘twist’.

What inspires your art? The work is predominately inspired by our love for music and pop culture. We are also avid photographers ourselves and have always had an affinity for photography. Streetart is the third ‘ingredient’ in the mix. Reinventing our icons and showing them to people on the streets where they least expect to see them is above all what drives us. 

Street Art by The Postman © The Postman

What is it especially about music/celebrities that appeals to you? It’s not so much celebrities that appeal to us. It’s all about people. Our heroes. The don’t exclusively make artworks of famous people. An interesting example is our Guardians of York project in 2021 where we celebrated 11 key workers from York that helped their community through the pandemic. That’s exactly what appeals to us. The celebration of inspiring people.

How do you go about making an artwork/print? This is a very difficult question to answer as the styles and techniques evolve constantly. In a nutshell, we combine a mixture of analog and digital work. Painting abstract artwork and blending them with imagery. This process goes back and forth until we achieve our desired outcome.

Jimi Hendrix by Gered Mankowitz

Do you have a favourite music photograph/image? This is a very difficult question as there are so many. Rockarchive work with many photographers we admire. We already work with a few including Andy Willsher, Kevin Cummins, Martyn Goodacre, Phil Nichols and Steve Rapport, Virgina Turbett. There are a number of photographers we admire including (but not limited to) Geoff MacCormack, Gered Mankowitz, Mick Rock and of course Jill Furmanovsky. If we have to choose one, let’s go with Jimi Hendrix by Gered Mankowitz. We love the image, it’s exactly the pose and composition we like to work with. And it’s Jimi, one of the greatest!

How did you get to work with Hogie? Dave was someone we have always looked up to. His catalogue is HUGE. I remember when he shared a post on IG in 2020 that his car had been broken into. We commented and our conversation started from there. Hogie has since become our dear friend, both professionally and personally. 

David Bowie by Ian Dickson

What is it about David Bowie that made him so iconic? Bowie is the ultimate icon and our biggest inspiration. He was also the first ever artwork we made. Musically he was a genius that reinvented himself constantly. He had a talent that any artist would dream of.

What do you hope to achieve in 2022? We would love to expand our network and collaborate with more inspiring artists. We are also looking to get a few urban arts projects on the way, but that’s all top secret for now. We are also hoping to launch our first NFT.

Finally, we would like to say that we are excited to be working with Rockarchive and are looking forward to seeing how our first print launch will be received.