"Tell yr friends its ok to make and enjoy hip hop if yr white, tell yr friends that hip hop is like punk cause you can do whatever you want with it, also tell yr friends you love them"
This guy makes a lot of stuff under a lot of monikers, and im in love with all of it. Grant Gronewald is from Illinois (which immediately brings him close to my heart) but resides in Melbourne, Australia. My friend Tim Kelly introduced me to Cougar Flashy through this film he made as a series of films on artists in his hometown of Melbourne (Tim now lives in Montreal and will be premiering the first 2 films in the montreal version of this series as part of Pop Montreal's Film Pop FYI y'all)
When you connect with an artist's work it is tempting to feel like you know the artist, or like they would understand everything if only you knew each other. This isnt exactly a fair impulse, but its important to be able to recognize your hunger and need in an artifact created by another person. It helps you understand yourself, to feel less alone, and to want to try and know other people.
I don't know Grant, but this is what his work represents to me: It represents the belief that all of your experiences and feelings are valid. That embracing the sad parts of life can be done with a sense of humor, and without paralysis. It says that life is temporal, and that thats hard, but there's freedom in it. That there's no reason not to enjoy yourself. That the best of life is hanging out with rad people making rad things. That you should be allowed to make whatever you feel like making. That exclusion and superiority of any kind is a waste of time. Live and let live.
probably this is just a reflection of what i believe, what i want to believe, to feel more secure in my own impulse to make things. But I still like to think that Grant would approve of the sentiment.
You can see drawings here (Hyper Color Castle Collective). If you send him a clothing article and work out a fair price, he will draw on it and send it back, I want something SO BAD, as soon as i have an income (which will be GOD ONLY KNOWS when) this is what I'm spending it on.
Cougar Flashy (Clearings?) music here
more music (prmnt blng) here
