SoCultures Magazine 2018 SoCultures Magazine November 2018 | Page 126

SoCultures November 2018
Cultural Innovations
Israel
Amit Shimoni
What inspired you to create Hipstory series?
Once I had an assignment to create communication through a preferred art. That's
when Hipstory was born. I was looking for a way to connect generation Y to
history's finest leaders. Googling, searching like any random teenager, for pictures
of hundred years old world leaders, all I could find were black & white, faded, old
pictures of leaders. Then the idea to “Hipsterize” them struck me This reality
frustrated the me deeply and brought to life this art series Hipstory – my way to
connect the Y generations with political and cultural visionaries of our past and
giving them a new way of expression in modern times.
What is a “Hipster”? Define it please!
"Hipster" is not a specific fashion way of dressing or acting like most people
would say. How I see it, it reflects the imbalance the Y generation is experiencing-
while everybody around is trying hard to be more unique, in reality, it seems
everybody is more and more of the same.
What does Hipstory wish to covey? What it talks about?
Let me clear what Hipstory doesn’t want to talk about.
It doesn't talk about politics, it talks about generation Y. I often find myself
wondering how different my generation, Y generation, is from the generation of
these great leaders of modern history. How different their belief system, the way
they thought and what motivated them, compared to our more self-centred
generation which is in a constant chase after fashion, style and trends as a way of
self-expression while steering away from the big ideologies and meanings of life.
I wanted HIPSTORY to re-imagine these great leaders and place them in a
different time and culture - ours. I wanted to create a sort of mirror- a mirror that
on the one hand is supposed to make one smile, but on the other, to make them also
think.
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