Art
Here’s what happened when a doodle artist met a 500-year-old city icon
To inspire the 62 creatives coming together for the Red Bull Doodle Art World Final, Mr Doodle produced a work that envelops Amsterdam’s 3X symbol with his signature art.
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Go to Amsterdam – anywhere in Amsterdam – and you can’t miss the striking graphic motif of three large X symbols. The city’s emblem, which is taken from its coat of arms and dates back to 1505, is everywhere: street poles, flags, building facades – even drain covers and garbage bins.
Now, in a special installation at Amsterdam’s STRAAT Museum, the emblem has been re-imagined, thanks to a transformation by internationally renowned artist Sam Cox, better known as Mr Doodle. The UK-based artist, who will be a judge at the Red Bull Doodle Art World Final to be held in Amsterdam in May 2023, created the work to inspire competition participants, as well as to leave his own mark on the art-loving city.
The STRAAT Museum is dedicated to street art and graffiti, and Mr Doodle created his triple X piece live during opening hours so that museumgoers could see his distinctive style in action. The artist is no stranger to working on unusual ‘canvases’ – among his most famous works are his own house, which he blanketed with black-and-white doodles inside and out, and The Doodle Bull, a spectacular showcar that resulted when he doodled on an Oracle Red Bull Racing RB 14 racecar from nose to rear wing.
Even so, at a height of six metres, the purpose-built sculpture of three X shapes stacked atop each other offered him a towering new challenge as it reached toward the rafters of the lofty STRAAT space.
The blank 6m sculpture is carefully assembled in Amsterdam's STRAAT Museum
© Ali Mousavi / Red Bull Content Pool
Mr Doodle came into the museum with an open mind regarding what he was going to doodle on the custom sculpture, allowing ideas to come to him as he worked his way up from the bottom of the piece. His finished creation will remain in Amsterdam throughout the Red Bull Doodle Art World Final for participants and the public to view up close.
“With this piece, it’s a total freestyle,” he said. “Red Bull Doodle Art is all about doodling and letting the mind wander, so it was about doing the purest type of doodle that I possibly can.”
Describing the doodling art form, he said, “My mind never feels tired from it. More energy comes from creating the doodles and seeing what they turn into.”
Mr Doodle lets his mind wander as he creates the 3X piece
© Ali Mousavi / Red Bull Content Pool
The global doodling competition taking place in May will feature 62 creatives – the best of more than 100,000 who entered worldwide – as they let their own minds wander and doodle new works in a three-day ‘phygital’ experience involving both the physical and digital realms of art. In his role as a member of the expert judging panel, Mr Doodle will consider the competition criteria of creativity, artistic skill and the way the doodle conveys a sense of loving life.
He provided further insights into what he hopes to see at the World Final, explaining, “I feel the strongest doodles are always the ones that are created naturally, with no sketch, and flow instinctively by themselves. I expect to see variety given the number of creatives coming from different countries being inspired by what’s around them.”
The World Final in Amsterdam will spotlight a public gallery of work by the participating creatives and will culminate with one young artist being crowned the global Red Bull Doodle Art winner. You can find out more about Mr Doodle and Red Bull Doodle Art here.
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