Icons Front Cover
©2015 Craig Ashby
Mixed media
7.5″ x 9.75″

A simple gridded notebook is the beginning of a new series entitled Icons. This notebook is covered in saved fruit stickers. My attempt to boast hip hop style how much fresh fruit we eat.

It took awhile to cover front and back. Then I covered the stickers with clear packing tape. A trick I have done for years to increase the longevity and durability of a sketchbook or notebook.

Initially I didn’t even know why I was doing it. Purely decorative work with no idea what I would do with the finished notebook.

Then I thought of an old Marvel Comics Sticker Book. A collectible concept to drain an impressionable child’s piggy bank. At that moment it all came together.

I would do a high school style sticker book. Each page would be self-created custom stickers. I knew I had to come up with what the stickers would be about. But instantly I knew they would be bitmap images utilizing the already present grid of the notebook.

Still no idea what the images would be based on. I thought of all the high school motifs. Bands and superheroes and television shows. Scribbles of these icons came flashing to my mind.

What if the notebook was of people I still admire. Icons that have helped me get through this horrible world. Icons that have made me a better person. And that’s how this began.