Love Messes You Up & Broken-Hearted Bear

Jon creates vibrant, neo primitive scrawls of shapes and colour. He’s pushed his monster-like characters into compositions where cartoon-like forms are crammed on top of each other until they create a screaming mass of energy. Intensely prolific, he has pushed the character obsession of the late 90s back into fashion and to another level. Working across a variety of mediums that includes drawing, painting, print, animation, large scale murals and toy design, his art retains a hand-made, hand-drawn quality. A sense of British self-deprecation, dry humour and modern-day anxiety imbues his work. He has exhibited internationally since 2001 and has work in the permanent collections of The Victoria and Albert Museum and The Science Museum in London. He lectures at Universities and presented his work at the prestigious Pictoplasma Character Design Conference (Berlin, 2006). He has received two D&AD Silver award nominations and has worked on many commercial projects for high profile organisations including: Cadbury, Pepsi, MTV, Levis and Rip Curl. In 2011, Jon relocated from Nottingham, UK to Brooklyn, NY. "Love should be everywhere in our daily life. Because Love is invisible, and we can’t touch it or buy it, we usually pass over it. Modern society lacks Love due to a lack of communication. If I want Love from someone, and I don’t give the person Love, it’s unfair. It’s wrong just requiring Love from someone. If you start giving Love to people around you, Love will be everywhere, and we can live happily. If the world were to embrace the Love Movement, it would solve many problems we have." –Nao "Many creators put their Love into this exhibition. Please feel their Love. Giving Love will bring even bigger Love back to you. We can spread Love. That is the Love Movement." –Shin