By HANNAH RUHOFF, Sun Herald
OCEAN SPRINGS, Miss. (AP) _ Moschino, an international luxury fashion brand from Italy, is known for loud, expressive designs with lots of bold color. And now, a Mississippi Coast artist is helping make it more colorful.
Their clothing and accessories often retail from several hundred to several thousands of dollars and have been worn by the biggest celebrities.
Dylan Sartin, 30, of St. Martin, is a tattoo artist at Twister Anchor Tattoo in Ocean Springs recently got the opportunity to collaborate with Moschino to create several illustrations.
Sartin, who has been tattooing for eight years, made an Instagram post back in 2019 showing off a recent tattoo he did inspired by Moschino. He tagged in the post both Moschino and its creative director, American fashion designer Jeremy Scott.
To his surprise, a month after the original post, Scott reached out to Sartin and commissioned him to create some illustrations to be used on future Moschino designs.
“When he contacted me I was star-struck,” said Sartin in a phone interview. “He is super prominent in the fashion world.”
Sartin collaborated with Scott, going back and forth on the designs for a few months before they settled on the final designs: watercolor paintings of personified fruits wearing Moschino designs inspired by Brazilian actress and singer Carmen Miranda’s signature fruit headdress.
In total, Sartin created 10 fruit illustrations for Moschino of an avocado, banana, pineapple, strawberry, papaya, lemon, coconut, dragon fruit, guarana and a jabuticaba.
After the illustrations were completed in 2019, COVID-19 struck and Moschino delayed releasing the designs. Sartin worried that the illustrations he created would never be used.
But on Oct. 8, Moschino made an Instagram post of Brazilian singer-songwriter Luisa Sonza wearing a Moschino tracksuit created in collaboration with Brazilian department store Riachuelo and printed with Sartin’s illustrations.
Since the post came out, Sartin has been receiving lots of positive, supportive comments on his designs and even had people ask if they can have the designs tattooed. As more designs using his illustrations come out, he’s excited to see the worldwide reaction.
Sartin, who originally wanted to go to art school but couldn’t afford it, said he has always enjoyed art but really blossomed and found his niche when he started tattooing.
Sartin says the key to being an artist is to practice your craft everyday, and not to be afraid of jumping in and doing the work.
He stressed the importance of getting your work out there, “if I didn’t put my work out there and tagged Moschino, they never would’ve seen my work. Art is made from the heart, but it’s also made to be seen so make sure it gets seen.”
Be the first to comment