What do graphic designers do in their spare time, when you let them exercise complete creative freedom? Well, you probably end up with something like this Tumblr site from Stockholm-based designer Kalle Mattsson. The site, Buffalo Bill Gates (via Imgur), combines half of an image with another, and it’s always a mash-up of two celebrities – both real and fictional. For example: Spockahontas (Star Trek’s Mr. Spock and Disney’s Pocahontas), Ringo Starnold Zwarzenegger (Ringo Starr and Arnold Schwarzenegger), Eminem C Hammer (rappers Eminem and MC Hammer), and Stevie Wonderwoman (Stevie Wonder and Wonder Woman).
Perhaps Buffalo Bill Gates is Mattsson’s comment on pop culture, or it’s simply a bunch of creative nonsense. Regardless, it reflects Mattsson’s direction as a graphic designer. “My starting point is that of the graphic designer, and if there is a need for an image solution, I find the right visual language, and execute it,” he writes on his personal page. “From one point of view they have nothing in common, the image maker and the graphic designer, but from another point of view, it is the same; you make things.”
It’s childishly silly but very funny – particularly the names given to the Frankenstein creations (still cracking up over Yoko Bono). Even Mattsson doesn’t seem to take it seriously. “These bastard images are all my fault. I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking. It’s awful, I know. I wish it didn’t have to be this way. I’m so sorry,” he writes. If you like them enough, you can purchase a print from Mattsson.
The Tumblr page was launched in 2014, but when we last checked it’s still going strong in 2017.
(Images via Buffalo Bill Gates/Kalle Mattsson)
Related Posts
Save $500 on the Sony a7 III with 28–70mm lens, a full-frame starter kit that still holds up
get the deal
Adobe’s Firefly AI now lets you edit videos by describing changes
The new Firefly video editor introduces a timeline view that lets users fine-tune frames, sounds, and pacing. Users can also edit videos through text transcripts, a feature aimed at spoken content. By deleting or rearranging lines in the transcript, Firefly automatically trims or reorders the corresponding video clips.
This tiny drone tracks, films, and follows you, and it finally has a sane price
get the deal