Capsule collection with Alberto Miranda
We launched a capsule collection with Alberto Miranda, a Spanish illustrator of whom we are tremendous fans.
Alberto, better known as Guajiro Bampo , has collaborated with major brands such as Netflix, The New York Times, El País, Harvard Business Review, KFC, Soho House... and with music groups such as Izal and Miss Caffeina.
In this capsule collection together with Minimalism, Alberto Miranda wanted to reflect something as universal as LOVE ❤️ . He has developed a total of 6 illustrations, of which the Minimalism community has selected 3.
Get to know the three most voted designs
The illustrations are small and placed on the chest of our organic cotton t-shirts . This collection follows the same dynamic as previous collaborations: we open a pre-sale process for about 30 days and, once this period ends, we only manufacture the garments that have been sold. In this way, we avoid generating surplus.
Once the collection is finished, these illustrations are not "marketed" again.
Below is the first part of the interview with Alberto Miranda in which you will find out who is behind this very special collection.
First of all, could you tell us who Alberto Miranda is?
Well, the truth is that my life has very little romance. I am a freelance illustrator and graphic designer born in an industrial town in Alicante, called Elda, during the stifling Levantine summer of 1991. I studied Advertising and PR at the University of Alicante and a year after finishing my degree I went to live in the Balkans as a volunteer. After that year I came to live and work in Madrid, which has been my city ever since.
Do you remember when you started illustrating? How has your evolution been over the last few years?
I have been drawing for as long as I can remember (and according to my mother, even before that). I was always good at it, honestly, and it is one of those things that happen in life where a person, by the mere fact of being born, finds their perfect match in life. Until I was 16, the only thing I did in my life was draw, it was my way of entertaining myself. Afterwards I gave it up for music for a few years, but it didn't go very well for me, I never felt as comfortable as I did when drawing. So at 25 I decided to draw again and recover something of myself that I felt I had lost.
I'm a very cerebral person, so I literally made a plan to get back into drawing. The year I moved abroad, I decided to buy a notebook and draw one page a day, every day. It didn't matter if I was inspired, tired, etc. The important thing was to draw and reacquaint myself with the language and fall in love with drawing again. After that year, I told myself that I had to find my own voice and my own style, so I spent another year finding something that I liked and that I felt had an interesting path. So little by little, I started to work on the foundations of what I do today.
And as things happen in life, at least in mine, in January 2018 I received an email from The Guardian US asking me to illustrate a long-form article with all the candidates for the 2020 American elections. And so began my “professional” journey and that is what has brought me here.
Alberto, do you consider yourself an artist?
Not at all. It's a term that I don't like at all. Not because I don't like the term, but because I think it's a concept that has been distorted to the extreme and I personally don't want to be associated with the meaning it has today. I don't define myself in any particular way since they all seem rather pompous or egocentric to me. I tell almost everyone that I'm a show-off, I like that one quite a bit.
And how do you feel when you are illustrating?
As I was saying, I think drawing is something inherent in me. It's something that's always been with me. Although I have to say that over the years I've realized that drawing is just a consequence and that what I really like is creating, that's what's natural in me. I think it can be summed up as: let me do whatever, but let me do it my way. I'm not going to be one of those people who say "drawing relaxes me" , shit 💩 , creating something stresses me out. It's like giving birth. It's voluntarily subjecting yourself to self-imposed pressure into which you pour out all your insecurities, desires or complexes. I dedicate myself to this and I have ambitions for which I put pressure on myself so there's always a layer of demand. I myself become Agassi's father. Even so, it's something that I love and that I can never stop doing, that's why I hate the word artist. Creative work is a hard work that requires discipline, hours and sweat. Romanticizing things is never good because it tends to sugarcoat reality.
Do you think it is important to find your own style?
For any creative person, the important thing is to find a discourse, not a style. Style is a consequence of discourse. If you create a good foundation, the steps you take in the future will be coherent and follow a line. I can be accused of many things, but I can never be accused of not being coherent with my principles, and what I do is nothing more than an extension of myself. In other words, I am my work and my work is me. Style can be fashion, trends or references, and that is temporary. It is the discourse that remains.
How would you define your discourse and your graphic proposal?
I would sum it up in three words: universal, simple and contemporary. Universal because I like to use visual codes without text so that they can be understood by most of the world. Simple, because like everything in life, the simpler the better and contemporary because I am a child of my time and I have to talk about what I know. In my case, I focus a lot on late capitalism.
Do you think that one is born with a certain type of aesthetic sensitivity or does it develop?
It's hard to say. I've always believed that I'm born with it because I have it, but the truth is that I don't know. I don't know if it was influenced by my environment and its tastes, by my father or my brother, who told me and showed me what was "good" and what wasn't. I think that aesthetic sensitivity is part of personality and I don't think we're very clear about how it's formed.
How important is it for you to develop personal projects?
Personal projects are vital to me. It's also something I try to do on a very regular basis. Personal projects are where we can grow the most and where we do something out of pure altruism. I've also always been very much in favour of the philosophy that if you don't get the commissions you think you deserve, you should do them yourself to show what you're capable of doing. In the last few months I've been working on a very special one and I hope that by the time this interview comes out I'll have already published it 👇 .
Let's talk about brands. What are they for you? What do you think they should be like?
Well, brands are something that is irremediably attached to me because I grew up in a world where brands dominate everything. I can make all the movies I want about what a world without consumerism would be like, but the reality is that I am a child of capitalism and brands are as much a part of my life as any other element of my personality. Fortunately or unfortunately, brands help us define ourselves and show others some traits of our personality or our own individuality. We all express ourselves through what we consume and how we consume it. Even not consuming is a form of consumption.
Brands were born as a response to the need to differentiate different types of products. Giving a company personality so that human beings could identify with them. We can never forget that the ultimate goal of a brand is to sell, but I believe, or I want to believe, that at present I am not satisfied with that. We need brands to be committed to more human values. Not just individual values that address our most basic needs. We need them to be committed to what we are committed to. Our duty as consumers is to know how to differentiate which brands are doing it to ride the wave and which brands are doing it because they truly believe that it is the way to do things.
What do you think of Minimalism?
I was already a follower and consumer of your product before this collaboration, so I can't be very objective. From the moment I discovered you, I feel very identified with everything you offer. From how you see fashion, from an aesthetic point of view, to how you understand the brand, with NoBrand for example and of course with your commitment to the environment and fair production. I am one of those who thinks that we should consume much less and consume much better and I think that Minimalism fits into that philosophy.
Finally, is there a book or reading you recommend?
Well, during the first lockdown I read The Plague by Albert Camus and I was shocked. Camus is one of the authors who has shaped my personality the most and this was a book I had been wanting to read and what better time than a global pandemic to read a book about the bubonic plague. I know that there will be many people who the last thing they want to do is keep thinking about pandemics, but it is a book that I recommend to everyone because it is not a book about pandemics, it is a book about the human condition. The plague in this case is just a vehicle.
Minimalism and Alberto Miranda T-shirt collection
Alberto Miranda's website
Alberto Miranda's Instagram
