Benjamin Anthony

Community ties is an exploration of peoples experiences with masculinity within the Queer community. Through working on this project in more of a community led and artistic manner it gave the opportunity to create a collection that brings my tongue in cheek design identity, inspired by brands and artists  like Adam Jones, Benjamin Robin and John Booth, and combining them with the lives of the people around me who have often aided in helping me bring a small idea into something beautiful. I think my own identity with Benjamin Anthony is to bring together something that, on the surface, is quite juvenile but injecting it with a darker underside. In this project specifically I wanted to explore the way Queer people were treated within the British education system but allowing it to live within the context of gay men’s sex and sexuality with the trope of Tops and Bottoms, pulling inspiration from artists like John Brooks and early David Hockney, and from 1930s underwear archetypes.  The continuation of Community Ties lives in a DIY world, that will build upon the understanding of Queer people, and I hope, will be able to help young Queer creatives forge their own identity and not feel as lonely as I did, because there’s a community out there who will have no issue helping draw on silly little underwear for you.