Behind the Pink Skeletons – Interview with Gianni Lee

If you walk around New York City, you’ll come across Gianni’s army of pink skeleton paintings dancing around. At this point, they’re the resident mascots of downtown.. In this interview we find out that Gianni Lee knows how to stand out. Style is emanating from everything he does. Whether it’s a keen sense of fashion, music, or art, he understands the idea of making what you do shine. Whether you are looking at his paintings, the clothing he designs, or the murals he does on the streets, you’re gonna wanna stop and look at it. Making the best out of very little, Gianni never curbs his imagination because something is in the way, instead, he finds a better, more clever way to do it, whatever it may be.

INTERVIEW WITH GIANNI LEE

What were some of your first creative outlets?

I was in art school from an early age and in extracurricular programs. I was in this mentally gifted class that was pretty creative as well.

Boys usually play with action figures and make them fight and come up with stories. But I would take it a step further sometimes.

I would make my own figures out of paper and cardboard that I would paint and draw on. I would make these characters that me and my friends could make-believe with and play out the shit that we saw on tv.

Then wrestling started getting popular and we used to flip on mattresses and pretend we was wrestlers. I always thought I was Shawn Michaels. Everybody thought they were Shawn Michaels.

Everything changed when The Rock came out, when The Rock came out, that was it… it was over.

What are your goals?

With everything that’s happening in the world, I’m just trying to find out what I can do that could help and move an entire group of people.

How could I actually use my platform to lead? I haven’t really figured out what that is but I feel like my goal in life probably is to move people in a certain way I just don’t know which way it is yet.

I just know I’m here for a bigger purpose and I guess right now I’m just taking that time to find out what that bigger purpose is.

How did you start painting?

So I moved to LA, I met Rihanna and ended up giving her a jacket. And after that, shit just went crazy. When Rihanna wore my jacket, everything just went up from there.

I started selling more work and eventually, there was too big of a demand and I couldn’t really keep up with it, so I kind of put it to the side. I’m gonna come back to it when the time is right, shits all about timing.

So I was making clothes. But I was like, this shit ain’t serving me as I wanted it to. I’ll probably end up getting back into it but I wasn’t feeling the whole cool kids club aspect of it all. I just wanted to paint. I just wanted to make shit.

Is there any good story behind your pink skeletons?

That’s a good question. I just wanted to do something in the street that was recognizable, but I didn’t want to write my name because I knew no one was going to be paying attention to that. But I knew people were going to be paying attention to a recognizable image that mimics a human. A skeleton mimics a human so I think it just kind of stands out, like how often you see pink skeletons?

What is the main difference in your approach to painting in studio vs. on the street?

Sometimes I like painting on the street more than I like painting indoors, which is crazy. But you make more money painting indoors because you get to keep all your pieces. Outside, you know that stuff doesn’t belong to you.

It belongs to the world.

When I’m in the studio, I’m thinking about how to make something that can last, something that could potentially be sellable. Sometimes I’ll just go until I feel like there’s nothing else for me to do. And then sometimes, even if it’s planned out, I’ll stop, and I’ll leave some shit unfinished.

I’m always in the streets though. Shit doesn’t get painted over in New York as much as it does in LA. In New York, things stay up way longer. If you’re putting all of this work in just for it to it painted over the next day, it’s like what’s the point.

Also New York is just where everything is actually happening in terms of fashion and art. Like everything is here and you can work with some amazing models as well.

When did fashion start to interest you?

My mom was a model so I was just around that my whole life. I was seeing Vogue magazine in Elle and Vanity Fair since I was like three, I would look at the magazines and fashion editorials.

I always thought it was amazing when you would see these black women in there. These tall, statuesque, black models.

Who a lot of them were African, with very strong African facial features.

That was inside my house, outside was just still the hood. Getting into fights, playing football, basketball, hide and go seek like all that stuff.

Did you seek creativity out yourself?

Yeah man, I sought that shit out myself. My mom always just pushed me to get into it, but it wasn’t that hard of a push. But it was a no-brainer for me.

I was also doing this neighborhood community program called Neighborhood Bike Works. We’re really into bikes in Philly. And Neighborhood Bike Works was like my first job and way to give back to the community. We would learn bike safety and everything about fixing bikes, taking them apart.

Then they were bringing younger kids and we would chaperone them and take them on bike rides. Basically be bigger brothers to them.

The guy, Andrew Dyson who ran Neighborhood Bike Works, saw my artwork and he saw how talented I was at a young age. He told me he heard about this school called Charter High School for Architecture and Design. Which is a school I eventually went to. We would study all forms of art.

We would dress in our uniform, an architect’s outfit, like khaki pants and blue shirts. [Laughs] we were nerdy as fuck.

It was cool for me because I was able to be in a space that allowed me to always want to do arts as a kid.

And what kind of space do you try to surround yourself in now?

I’m looking for critique more than anything. I want to be around peers who think of this shit on a high level. People telling me how I can be better. A place to build work off of each other that community. And I felt like it was a stronger community in New York for art and fashion than in LA, where I was living originally. So I just made the move one day, packed up my things and threw everything else out of my place in LA, and moved to New York.

I love Soho, all the models and the young black kids that are running the show there. All different shades. and types of kids. They go out there and they just get fly and create this community and energy down there. I think even those kids are just as important as the customers that have money. A lot of those kids are scamming or can’t even afford that shit,

It’s like a huge fashion show.

What do you feel like you’re trying to capture in your paintings?

I think I had a moment when I first started painting I just wanted to shock people and make them feel uneasy.

I felt like I wanted to conform a little bit. I don’t know why, I guess we all do as artists, get that feeling where we want everybody to love it.

I think I was painting for people instead of painting for myself. And now I’m back into this space where I just want to paint for myself and shock people, make people feel a little bit uneasy. I feel like that’s the best work. So I’m about to go back to darker more grotesque looking things. I might even get more grotesque. I think that’s just where I need to go, like people getting their head chopped off type of paintings.

I have this love/hate for the dark things.

I’m not a dark individual but I appreciate the macabre. Just weird, off-kilter, unattractive things. I think there’s beauty in those. Sometimes they tell a deeper story. Instead of the pretty things that are fabricated, shaved, chiseled, smoothed out and polished for you.