Benjamin Gray

 

These works are created using a technique known as marquetry. Every color you see is a separate piece of wood, only 1/42 of an inch thick, individually cut out and then assembled. After assembly, the entire picture is glued to a solid backing board for stability. The yellow background field is dyed, but every other color is the natural appearance of a different species of wood. Each one of these 30 pieces recreates a real ice cream truck pricing sticker from the early to mid-1990s, with some license taken in simplifying them to account for the limitations of the medium. The artist first redrew the original sticker images. Then each color was separated and cut out of a different type of wood. The goal of this work is to recapture and celebrate this vintage ephemera of our childhoods. Stand back and picture yourself on a warm summer afternoon, having just heard the music coming down your street. Which one will you choose today?