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Artist: Sweet Toof

Title: Ruff Neck

Medium: Mixed Media on paper

Size:  2 3/4 x 3 3/4

Markings:  Hand Signed, Titled on back

Condition:  Excellent

With COA 

According to an interview, he began tagging at age 13, saving up 50 p (pence) lunch money and buying cheap spray cans to go out at night, before evolving to the more distinctive work for which he has become well known, and eventually going on to study and graduate from the Royal Academy of Arts, with a master's degree.

According to an account by Olly Beck, Sweet Toof looked at himself in a looking glass "in crisis after a messy break-up", with the enlarged and distorted imagery of the "crescents of teeth", the "visible part of our skeletal frame" as a reminder of mortality.[1] Beck relates Sweet Toof's concerns and imagery with the 16th Century Northern European "Vanitas" tradition of reminding of the transience and vanity of life, and to the Mexican celebration of skull imagery to accepting, honouring and celebrating death as part of the life trip.[1]

Sweet Toof's skull
A Sweet Toof work in Brick Lane, London

Sweet Toof's own comments seem to uphold this interpretation, in which the artist comments, "To get one's teeth into things, before it's too late." [1]Elsewhere he notes, "Teeth can be really sexy, or aggressive, but they're also constant reminders of death. They're how we get recognised by police when there's nothing else left."




Sweet Toof’s work starts with and evolves out of his street art, whether as a solo graffiti artist or in collaboration with others. Like the streets of 1980s New York, Britain’s streets today are being reclaimed by an ever-increasing army of street artists of which Sweet Toof is one of the most prolific and artful.  Typical tags, throw-ups, and more elaborate street pieces become a whole language that informs his studio works.

 

Equally disciplined in traditional painting and printmaking techniques, Sweet Toof masterfully blends urban detritus with bygone decadence. Fusing ancient methods with modern materials, Sweet Toof’s imagery combines layers of historical and current cultural references to create unconventional, iconoclastic art that is at once both traditional and contemporary.