Killer Acid — An artist in cartoonish psychedelia
Killer Acid Was Originally Created By Artist R. Corradetti In 2010. Located In Santa Cruz, CA, The Brand Specializes In Screen Prints, T-Shirts, And A Myriad Of Mysterious, Humorous, And Highly-Detailed Psychedelic Ephemera. Not Only Does Killer Acid Create Amazing Clothing, But They Have Made Their Way Into The NFT Space Already As Well. Their Work Is Incredibly Unique, Intricate, And Eye Catching.
The Style Is A Blend Of Head Shop And Punk Rock, Hearkening Back To The Artist’s Tumultuous And Technicolor Coming-Of-Age In New York City. Corradetti’s Cartoon Psychedelia Drips With His Signature Tongue-In-Cheek Humor. Random, Bright, And Bizarre, The Work Draws The Viewer In. Upon Closer Inspection, Though, One Finds The Headscapes And Doodles Are Interwoven With Personal Meanings And Artifacts Of Memories. Entering A Burgeoning Crypto Art Community In 2018, Killer Acid NFTs Were The First Minted On The Superrare Test Net. ‘I’m Not As Think As You Stoned I Am’ Is Their First Release With Nifty Gateway.
Corradetti grew up in Delaware in the 1980s — not exactly a hub of art and culture. His father was a Spanish teacher so we had a bunch of art books in the house. When he was nine or ten he was obsessed with Picasso.Corradetti had an easel and painted with oil paints in an unventilated basement. Sniffing fumes by accident he thinks got him a little transported.
In high school, He fell in with an artsy, mind-expansive crowd. Those guys encouraged him to make drawings and write songs. When he was sixteen, he started drawing psychedelic cartoons. He has a notebook from 1995 where this adventure clearly begins. He was very familiar with various well-known album covers, even if he didn’t know who the artists of the albums were. These explorations have subtly influenced Corradetti’s subsequent creative career.
Corradetti also has unique ideas about why he chose the path of an artist. He believes that if a person grows up needing someone else to tell him how to make decisions about everything, he will not be able to see everything on a level playing field. Perhaps because of his environment, or by choice, he had a long childhood of innocence, and Corradetti feels this is more reflected in his artwork, where he is always trying to get back to that place where space feels boundless and he doesn’t have a place to be.
Killer Acid was a phrase in a song by his old band. It had a nice ring to it and made sense for the project he wanted to start when he was at a creative crossroads back in 2010. Killer Acid has morphed more into a brand name over the years. Corradetti never corrects people when they use it as his art name. It’s just kind of whatever people want it to be at this point. Corradetti encourages confusion and ambiguity as part of our core message.
Happiness is all around if you can just stop for a minute and not think about it. That’s the trick. Moment by moment. Get on the bus?
Some people call his artwork is lowbrow, but to him that’s weird because I think of lowbrow as being a specific art movement. I think of Big Daddy Roth, hotrods, and roided out rodents. I feel like lowbrow is meant to shock the viewer by being overly blunt, exaggerated, or grotesque. But Killer Acid himself is a fan and follower of these things, and he himself is very grateful for the tone of the discourse. But the work he’s most proud of is on the personal side, dealing in some way with psychology or mental illness; Killer Acid will always throw in a quick doodle or two to amuse himself, but it’s a pleasing way to do so. His own favorite creations are the big ones that take a while to develop, and they come from a quieter place deep inside.
Corradetti studied in Paris at the age of 20 through an exchange program. Jean Cocteau was his first admired artist. He did a lot of things: painting, frescoes, plays, films, sculpture. Because of Cocteau’s influence, Corradetti always wanted to try something new. This had a profound meaning for him, he saw a lot of artists get popular for making a thing, so they just kept making that same thing forever. So he thinks it’s way cooler to try something new, even if you fail.
The word “psychedelic” is used so often and so freely that it has been applied to so many types of art, music and experiences that it has almost lost its original meaning. The word “psychedelic” is derived from the ancient Greek word meaning “manifestation of the mind”. When something feels good, what has been mulled over jumps out of the mind, follows a direction, and jumps onto the page in a trance-like manner.
While his work may seem loud, rebellious, and covered in a smoky psychedelic feel, Corradetti’s work feels completely his own. Artistic creation has become a prominent way for R. Corradetti to go into conversation about mental health. Although he draws inspiration from the lowbrow, psychological and surreal art movements, it is psychedelic and positive, with a sense of humor, whimsy and exploration.
