Vans, the original action sports brand and advocate for creative expression since 1966, continues to push creativity beyond imagination through collaborating with talented artists around the world. To celebrate the new decade and upcoming year of the Rat, Vans partners with Chinese artist Zhao Zhao to launch the new year collection representing the explorative and experimental nature of street rat – encapsulating the adventurous “Off the Wall” spirit.
The Vans & Zhao Zhao Year of the Rat Collection showcases how street rats experience and navigate the underground with their unique creativity. The footwear capsule begins with Vans’ classic Old Skool wrapped in light grey suede uppers and finished with the dark grey signature Sidestripe, together with a stacked cutout heel counter to mimic the entrance of rat tunnels. The model comes with the Vans’ classic Waffle sole in pink.
The Vans Era boasts an all-over monotone with suede uppers and outsole in grey, it also features a conceptualized “layered” heel tab.
The Sk8-Hi incorporates a graphic that illustrates rat tunnels stretching through the underground – embodied on leather Sidestripes and the transparent Wafflesole with circular patterns.
The Era Lacey features double-lace design with one of the checkerboard shoelaces penetrating the side and back of the uppers, yet another motif showcasing the multi-dimensional rat tunnel inspiration. The model includes checkerboard foxing tape and transparent Wafflesole with asymmetrical patterns.
The Comfycush Slip-Skool seamlessly merges and reimagines Vans’ Slip-on and Old Skool. The pattern resembles the dynamic underground passageways used by rats in dense urban landscapes. The model features the Slip-on as the inner core construction with a transparent Old Skool silhouette casing. The Slip-Skool features the Comfycush insole to provide lasting comfort. The whole footwear capsule highlights a reinvention of Vans’ iconic heel tab where Vans and Zhao Zhao placed the Vans “Off the Wall” logo with a rat tail to symbolize the whole collection.
The collection comes with an apparel set, including unisex oversized hoodies in dark grey with the Year of the Rat collection logo printed on the chest. The full Vans & Zhao Zhao Year of the Rat Collection will be available from 31 December across Vans retail stores and online, stay tuned on local Vans social media accounts for releasing details.
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About Zhao Zhao
Born in Xinjiang, 1982. Now Zhao Zhao works and lives in Beijing and Los Angeles.
All along Zhao Zhao was making work with a subversive appeal of its own, keens on raising challenges on the reality and its traditional practice of art form through a various art media. Zhao Zhao is known for making sculptures, paintings and installations which examine the power of individual free will and the dynamics of state control. Zhao Zhao’s works attest to and touch on the awareness of a generation faced with dramatic change. Constantly confronted with the subject of world oppression. Notions of threat or risk are regularly present in his works, referring to the life he lives both locally and within today’s global context, as a method of questioning the historical impermanence in our contemporary society.
He is very reflective on how concerns of the collectivity co-exist with the individual’s daily expectations and dreams. His provocative, multidisciplinary artist practice has garnered him international attention in recent years, includes solo shows in galleries such as Alexander Ochs Galleries (Berlin, Germany), Carl Kostyál foundation (Stockholm, Sweden), Roberts & Tilton (Log Angeles, USA), Chambers Fine Art (New York, USA), Mizuma Art Gallery (Tokyo, Japan), Lin & Lin Gallery (Taipei), Tang Contemporary Art (Beijing, China), CAAW (Beijing, China).
He has received the support from many international institutions including The Museum of Modern Art (New York, USA), Tampa Museum of Art (Florida, USA), Pinchuk Art Centre (Kiev, Ukraine) , Groninger Museum (Groningen, Netherlands), Museum of Asian Art (Berlin, Germany), Collection of Hamburg Bahnhof Museum in Berlin (Berlin, Germany) and more. In 2019, Zhao Zhao won the Thirteenth AAC Artist of the Year Award. The Project Taklamakan of his was elected as the background picture of 2017 Yokohama Triennale Poster and catalog. At the same year, he was appraised as Top 10 Chinese artist by CoBo and obtained the award nomination of Chinese annual young artist in 11th ACC (Award of Art China) and one of Modern Painters “25 Artists to Watch”.