12ozProphet

While surfing the big web, I bumped into an amazing artist from Sweden. His name is Hannes Isaksson and he is a bad ass illustrator. His naive style is hard to compete against… I contacted him to get a little bit more information about him and his fascination for the New York most notorious gangsters. Here is what Hannes has to say:

Think it was in 2005 after I had seen Paid In Full, that I read the FEDS article about Alpo, Rich and Azie. I found it incredible that it was actually based on a true story. So that got me a little curious of the American crack era. After that I started reading about The Supreme Team, cause of the whole Murder Inc/Supreme thing. And the more I read about it the more the more fascinating it got; lookouts with walkie talkies on rooftops, embroided Supreme Team jackets, assault teams armed with machine guns, the way they dressed, that they had names like Robo justice, Prince, Divine, Black Just. I actually made board game about the drug trade in Jamaica Queens. By that time i was pretty much obsessed with drug crews and kingpins. I find their life stories beyond compelling, even though they’re kind of similar. They start to hustle, they come up in the game, live like kings for a couple of years and then they go to jail for the rest of their lifes or get killed. I think most people can relate to that, the wish to become someone, even if it means spending the rest of your life in jail. I can anyhow.

Here is Hannes’s Bio:
Born and raised in Stockholm, Sweden.
Attended Stockholm Art School in 2003, went to Nyckelviken School of Arts 2004.
And in 2005 i enrolled at Idun Loven art school wich I graduated from in 2007.
Right now Im part of the Detroit Stockholm art collective and last year I released a book/magazine called “Aint no Uzis made in Harlem” on Cederteg Publishing