FIFA Art

Soccer is the only sport I can stand to actually watch on TV.. and actually get loud and yell at the screen. It must be from watching all those soccer games in in the living room with my dad while growing up in the Ivory Coast, where people are crazy for soccer!


It's been four years since I wore my bright orange Ivory Coast soccer jersey to watch the national team called the Elephants, battle it out at the World Cup. I was lucky enough to be asked to be the artist to represent the Ivory Coast in creative agency Uniform.net's World Cup Challenge; an online match-up of 32 artists and graphic designers from each of the countries playing in the World Cup.

After each World Cup match, the designer is expected to create a piece of work within a 90 minute time frame and supply it within 24 hours of the game, with both competing pieces of artwork presented side by side on 326490.com. Over 64 matches the collected images will provide a unique creative expression of the World Cup muse. 

What a great idea! All of the artwork created will be sold in limited edition prints and collected into a book to sell for charity. 

Here are the pieces I created for the 326490 challenge:

Game 1:
Triumph! The Elephants are back! They won their first game 2-1, playing against Japan.
YES YES YESSSS!!! WE'RE IN IT!! GLORIOUS!!

Game 2:
The Elephants lost 2-1 against Colombia. Kicked up a lot of dirt and energy, though.
Sadly, the younger brother of two of the team's players passed away hours after the game. Very sad day.

Game 3:
So close to moving onto the second round of games! The score was 1-1 against Greece until literally the very last minute, when a foul was called on one of the Ivorian players and Greece was allowed a penalty kick which won them the game.
SO NOT FAIR!!!! The elephants were sluggish and stunned.
WE COULD HAVE HAD IT!

After the end of this game, I was stunned into silence. (Sigh) we totally almost had it. 
I'm still wearing my jersey to sleep in solidarity. I'll put it away in July until four years from now when the nest World Cup starts up again. Fingers crossed for better luck for the Elephants.  

You can take a look at the ongoing creative matches here: http://326490.com/
There is some great graphic design going on!