Rolling Stone
Illustration, collage
2022
Invited by friends at Essentials Creative, Zavala was asked to help design a letter for a collaborative outdoor sign. The project was for the Creator House venue in downtown Austin, Texas during SXSW 2022, commissioned by Cogent World for Rolling Stone and Meta. The sign included letter designs by six other Texan creatives. The sign spelt out "Creator" and was placed outside the venue.
Detail
Inspired by Zavala's research and practice around queering botany, he decided to create a collage combining botanical illustrations of plants that are connected to queer stories and culture.
Plants included:
bee orchid (an orchid flower that is pollinated by impersonating female bees)
calamus (poems by Walt Whitman about male love)
cypress tree (see the myth of Cyparissus and Apollo)
green carnation (see Oscar Wilde)
hyacinth (see the myth of Hyakinthos and Apollo)
lavender (see the lavender scare, lavender menace, and "streak of lavender")
morning glory (associated with the Aztec god, and patron of homosexuals, Xochipilli)
pansy (recently reclaimed homophobic slur)
Photo by Fabian Villa, 2022.
Contributing artists:
C by Manik Raj Nakra
R by Calder Kamin
E by Essentials Creative (Fabian Villa, Misa Yamamoto, Steven Casanova)
A by Angela Fox
O by Christina Coleman
R by Dave McClinton
