Special-edition, Congolese-inspired TOMS Shoes
We're teaming up with Giving Partner Eastern Congo Initiative (ECI), an advocacy and grant-making organization founded by Ben Affleck, on two Congolese-inspired designs with an additional give. Read More >>
TOMS x charity: water - An Eyewer collaboration
TOMS and charity: water, an organization founded in 2006 (like TOMS!) that’s dedicated to to helping bring clean and safe drinking water to people in developing nations, join forces for the first-ever TOMS Eyewear collab! Read More >>
Giving TOMS Shoes in the DRC
Founded by Ben Affleck in 2010, ECI is an advocacy and grant-making organization that works with and for the people of DRC, the third most populous country in Africa, and one that struggled under a cycle of violence for nearly 20 years – particularly in the east. Read More >>
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Head-to-head at Akira in Chicago: TOMS Featured Artists Steve Amos & Justus Roe
Head-to-head: TOMS Featured Artists Steve Amos & Justus Roe In gearing up for weekend, the TOMS family’s getting excited to be heading to Chicago to celebrate the 10th anniversary of TOMS retailer Akira!
As part of the bazaar + celebration, two talented artists from the Chicago Artists’ Coalition will take their skills to canvas before the TOMS + Akira crowd. Then, once they’ve laid their supplies to rest, TOMS fans in attendance can vote for their favorite artist and enter to win some TOMS goodies.
So, while you’re getting pumped for the big event, we’ll take a minute to introduce the two guys whose work you’ll be voting on…
Artist: Steve Amos
Hometown: East Moline, Illinois
Favorite TOMS gear: TOMS Eyewear
TOMS: Steve, what are some of the things that inspire you most in your art and in your creative day-to-day?
SA: I’m inspired by the world around me – [like most,] by travel, and by Chicago, the interesting city where I live.
TOMS: So that Chi-town fans get to know the man in battle…pretend you get to live inside a movie. Which do you choose to call home?
SA: Star Wars, Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back. [Boom.]
TOMS: Most spontaneous activity you’ve done recently?
SA: Live art for this event.
I’m usually a very private artist and my practice is fairly solitary. I paint quickly, but this is the first time I will paint live in front of an audience (aside from demonstrations that I do for students). I’m looking forward to the challenge of taking this personal activity of art making and doing it in public.
Artist: Justus Roe
Hometown: Chicago, but I think I was secretly born in Los Angeles. Somehow I briefly made it out of the Midwest to live in Firenze, Italy and to travel throughout Brazil, Japan and Eastern + Western Europe: Turkey, Ireland, Scotland and Russia.
Favorite TOMS gear: Men’s Desert Botas
TOMS: Justus Roe (sounds like you’re a first-name, last-name kind of guy), what are some your loudest sources of inspiration?
JR: Chicago, urban landscapes, vandals, the 1985 Bears, the 2005 White Sox, Italian Futurists, early American graffiti participants (phase 2), Fleetwood Mac, Icy Demons, Shape Shoppe recording studio, Drag City Records…. Just to name a few.
TOMS: So that Chi-town fans get to know the man in battle…pretend you get to live inside a movie. Which do you choose to call home?
JR: I call home a worn down, fuzzed-out, bad-tracking VHS copy of Star Wars & Style Wars. Trains and spaceships forever! [Sound familiar?]
TOMS: Most spontaneous activity you’ve done recently?
JR: Cleaned the bathroom without the wife asking and went to visit the Chess Records studio tour.
So, which one of these fellas will have your vote? The Star Wars-loving, urban gentleman? Oh wait – they’re both that. See the art they shape at the Akira event this Saturday and decide!
More info on the Facebook event. Hope to see you there!
